Work in Progress
by leahloahla
Summary: Someone is killing people in Univille, South Dakota. The BAU is called in to solve the murders and catch the killer, but what if the unsub has an artifact? Can the gang from Warehouse 13 find the artifact and stop the killer before the BAU?
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Hello people :) so this story is the product of my overactive imagination during christmas break. I recently became obsessed with Warehouse 13 and Criminal Minds, and I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if both teams were working the same case, but from different angles. I'm still not sure on the title yet, so it could change. This story obviously takes place AU, the setting for Criminal Minds is season 7 as of episode 10, _The Bittersweet Science_ and for Warehouse 13, season 2 before H.G. Wells was reinstated and Kelly never existed in this world. I hope you like it, and thanks in advance for reading. (hopefully you'll read it and you weren't put off by my blabbing)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters, I'm just borrowing them.**

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><p>Work in Progress<p>

Chapter 1

_There's definitely something weird about this case_, Supervisory Special Agent Emily Prentiss thought to herself as she walked through the bull pen of the Univille police department in South Dakota. The BAU had been assigned the case two days ago and since they arrived there had already been three killings. One of the aspects that attributed to the weirdness was the fact that all the killings in Univille had happened the night before. Before they had arrived there had also been two killings in the next town over called Feather Head. The deaths were caused by some sort of unique hunting knife that Penelope Garcia, their Technical Analyst had still been unable to identify. They were running low on suspects and sleep; it was already one in the morning and hardly any members of the team had had more than four hours of sleep. Whoever this UNSUB was, he was killing fast and it seemed almost randomly. Out of the five killings, two had happened in the victim's homes at night, one of the killings in feather head had happened in broad daylight and the other two had been on the street around midnight. All the victims had been stabbed seventeen times before their throats were finally slashed. They could barely profile the UNSUB which meant that he would most likely kill again before they could even come up with one. Emily joined the rest of her team, including Garcia via webcam, at the large table in the corner of the bull pen.

"Have there been any new leads?" Emily asked as she scanned over the crime scene photos for what must have been the thousandth time that day.

"Unfortunately, no there hasn't been," Hotch replied.

As Unit Chief SSA Aaron Hotchner looked over his team he could tell that they were all running on low batteries. They all desperately needed sleep and he would probably be the only one they would listen to and not fight against for suggesting it. This case was already starting to wear them down and it had only been the second day. The team had already visited all the crime scenes, talked to any witnesses they had and gone over all the evidence.

"Alright, I want everyone to go back to the bed and breakfast and meet back here at eight AM, we're all exhausted and we can't help the investigation if we're all over tired and cranky," Hotch said, looking pointedly at SSA Jennifer Jareau.

Earlier JJ had almost bit off Garcia's head for taking longer than five seconds to find some information. JJ sighed, nodded at Hotch and headed to get her bag from a desk where she had left it. Things had become more strained than usual with will and she hated being gone longer than necessary. She really did regret the way she had snapped at Garcia though, she had done nothing wrong, JJ was just over tired.

Back at the table, a certain agent was voicing his disagreement.

"Hotch come on, I'm fine," SSA Derek Morgan persisted. "A little lack of sleep never killed anyone."

"Actually that statement is very untrue; it's very possible to doe from sleep deprivation." SSA Dr. Spencer Reid stated. "Usually this is the result of the fact that the immune system is weakened without sleep. The number of white blood cells within the body decreases, as does the activity of the remaining white blood cells. The body also decreases the amount of growth hormone produced. The ability of the body to metabolize sugar declines, turning sugar into fat. One study stated that people who sleep less than four hours per night are three times more likely to die within the next six years. Although the longest a human has remained awake was eleven days rats that are continually deprived of sleep die within two to five weeks, generally due to their severely weakened immune system."

"When Reid starts talking about death and rats, that means I'm outta here," Prentiss said, grabbed her stuff and headed over to the door to wait with JJ for their ride.

"Morgan, Hotch is right. We won't be able to help anyone if we can't even help ourselves," SSA David Rossi said, attempting to persuade Morgan.

Morgan, obviously frustrated, sighed and looked at each of his team mates. They all looked horrible; you could see the exhaustion on each of their faces and if they all looked that bad he could only imagine what he looked like.

"Alright, fine," Morgan said and rubbed a hand over his face.

"Close your eyes, left then right, goodnight starlight. Or starlights... okay bye," Garcia said before signing off.

The team of profilers headed out of the police station, got into their black SUVs and drove straight to Leena's Bed & Breakfast.

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><p>Claudia Donovan had just got back to the B&amp;B and laid down in her bed which she had been practically deprived of for the last two days. Her boss at the Warehouse, Artie Nielson had kept her there to help him locate a very dangerous artifact that had found its way into town. The other Warehouse agents, Myka Bering and Pete Lattimer had been in Seattle, trying to locate another artifact which left Claudia to deal with Artie on her own. She was seriously starting to wonder if that man ever got any sleep because when she left at twelve thirty AM he was still searching frantically through his office, as usual. It was now a little past one and Claudia was in serious need of some sleep. Just as she was about to fall into the unconsciousness of sleep, she heard footsteps coming up the stairs of the B&amp;B. She then heard a multitude of voices coming from the hall outside her door. She got up out of bed, very frustrated with the noise level coming from the hall. As she got closer to the door she could hear that the voices didn't belong to her friends, rather a large group of adults trying to decide which room they would be taking.<p>

Now very mad, Claudia whipped open her door and glared at the first person to look at her.

"Dude. What is with all the hubbabulu? I'm trying to sleep!" she said and found herself face to face with a startled group of tired adults. She noticed that some of them wore badges on their belts and deduced that they were FBI agents.

"Oh, sorry we were under the impression that there was no one else here," came a voice from Claudia's left. She turned around to see that the speaker was a very tall, very muscular and very good looking man with dark skin.

"Well hello there," Claudia said, perking up a bit. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"No thanks, we're just trying to figure out who get the room on the end there," he said referring to the room to the right of Myka's next to the stairs.

"Ah. And how long will you be staying?" Claudia asked sceptically. She was under the impression that the B&B was reserved for Warehouse agents only.

Morgan exchanged a glance with the rest of his team. This young redhead with the turquoise stripe in her hair seemed very interested in what they were doing. It was a little concerning because if she was staying at the bed and breakfast then she couldn't be in town for very long but she also seemed as though she'd been there for a while. Morgan was too tired to analyse that though any further and decided to extend his hand instead.

"SSA Derek Morgan, BAU. We're here investigating the murders," he said.

At the word murder, Claudia froze. They were FBI agents. Staying at Leena's. With the warehouse agents. Both teams were working on the same case. She knew the blond had looked familiar; Claudia had seen her on TV earlier that day.

"Uh, hi. Claudia Donovan. Will you just excuse..." Claudia said before bolting for the stairs. "Leena!" she shouted from the top step. Halfway down the stairs she turned around and ran back to her bedroom door, shutting it loudly and she hurried back down the steps. "Leena!" Claudia called again from somewhere downstairs.

The team of BAU profilers looked at each other for a moment before bursting into a fit of laughter. Well all except for Hotch and Morgan. Hotch walked down the hall past the first four rooms and picked the one at the end of the hall facing the rest of the hall. Morgan, shaking his head walked to the room on the left of Hotch's. They both closed their doors, leaving Rossi, JJ, Prentiss and Reid in the hall.

"What do you think?" Rossi asked to the agents next to him. "Suspect or paranoid teenager?"

"Well, that's really hard to say at this point," Reid started. "You know, most teenagers-"

"Reid?" he was cut off by Prentiss. "You say one more word and I'm throwing you down the stairs."

Reid looked at Prentiss and saw that she was dead serious.

"Okay, well good night," he said and walked into the room across from Morgan.

Rossi followed behind the younger agent and picked the room in between Morgan's and Claudia's.

"I'll take the one on the end," Prentiss said. "Night JJ."

"Night," JJ responded and both women went to their rooms for some needed sleep.

Meanwhile, downstairs, Claudia had finally located Leena, her friend and the owner of the B&B.

"What the hell Leena!" Claudia exclaimed.

"What?" Leena asked.

"You know what! Why are there FBI agents staying here?"

"They needed someplace to stay."

"Then why didn't they find a hotel?"

"Look, Claud, Mrs. Fredrick asked me to let them stay here! What was I going to say? No?"

"Oh well when you put it like that. Yes! Wait, does Artie know?" Claudia asked.

"No." Leena said and looked down at the floor.

"Oh man, you are so dead!" Claudia said, pitying her friend for having to explain this to Artie. "Oh yeah, when did we get five extra rooms?"

"It's an artifact thing." Leena said hesitantly.

"Sweet," Claudia said and returned upstairs. She was relieved to see that the BAU agents had finally chosen rooms and were quiet but now Claudia would never be able to sleep with them in the house.

Claudia let out a very loud frustrated groan before dropping down on the bed. Regardless of what she just thought about not being able to sleep, she drifted off not two minutes later.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: I wanted to say thanks for those of you who read my story :) it's still in its introduction phase, and I promise it will get better (i hope). I'm back to school and I have exams in a few weeks so i might not get a chance to update for a while, but I'll try! and PLEASE if you see any spelling mistakes, LET ME KNOW! I hate spelling errors, they drive me crazy (especially if it's something obvious) and I'm cartainly not immune to them, so telling me would help. Thanks! :)**

**Disclaimer: obviously, they're not my characters.**

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><p>Chapter 2<p>

"Uh, Pete? I don't think your truck is supposed to be making that noise." Myka Bering said warily to her partner Pete Lattimer. They had been on the road for the last two hours from the airport and Pete was driving. The truck was making an odd sputtering noise that put Myka on edge.

"Oh, no. its fine, we just need some gas but we can make it back to Leena's on what we have. Besides, it's not like the gas station is open at four am anyway." Pete replied to his nervous partner. They were only ten minutes away from the B&B and he was sure they could make it. The truck made another disapproving sound and started to slow down.

"Well Pete, if you knew we needed gas why didn't you stop earlier when the gas stations were still open?" Myka asked. She was exhausted from their last assignment. It took a lot longer to tag, bag and snag the artifact than they had expected and Myka just wanted to get some well deserved sleep.

"Because, I thought we could make it back without having to stop. Look we're only like seven minutes away now! We can totally make it!" Pete said enthusiastically just as the truck slowed down to almost a crawl. Myka looked at Pete as he pulled the vehicle to the side of the road.

"Pete!" Myka whined.

"Hey, it's okay we can just... walk the rest of the way. Myka groaned and watched as Pete reached over and pulled out a pack of Twizzlers from the glove department. "Here," he said and handed it to Myka.

"Really Pete? You think you can make this situation better with a pack of Twizzlers?" Myka said angrily.

"Well did they?" Pete asked with a knowing tone in his voice.

"A little," Myka admitted, opened her door, got out and started walking towards the B&B. Pete joined her two seconds later after locking the truck. "Pete?" Myka said, and turned to her Secret Service partner. "Artifact?"

"Oh. Oh! Right," he exclaimed and ran back to the truck to get the artifact out of the back.

The two agents walked in silence for a few minutes, Myka munching away at her Twizzlers and Pete making faces in the shop windows. As Myka was eating her snack, she swore she could hear someone besides Pete walking around the street. But every time she looked around, she found that they were the only ones out at this hour.

As the pair passed a side alley, something caught Myka's attention. She stopped dead in her tracks, making Pete come back to see what she was looking at. Pete was genuinely having a good time making faces at security cameras and store windows and as he walked back to see what his partner was looking at he got a very, very bad vibe.

"Hey Myka, I think we should probably get out of here," he said as he came up beside her. Myka didn't say anything though, she just pointed down the alley and something. When Pete followed her finger he saw the body of a young man lying next to a dumpster.

"Is that?" Pete said in disbelief.

"Yeah."

"And do you think he's?"

"Yeah."

The two agents turned to look at each other; each of their faces had a questioning look plastered onto it.

"So,' Myka said, breaking the silence. "Who do we call?"

"Well," Pete hesitated. "Um, the police? Okay you call Artie and I'll call the cops," he guessed and pulled out his phone. Pete walked a little way down the street and called the police department while Myka took the Farnsworth and attempted to call Artie. Of course he never answered so Myka walked over to where Pete was standing. Pete hung up the phone and turned to Myka.

"They said they should be here in a few minutes. What did Artie say?" Pete asked.

"I couldn't get a hold of him. He could be sleeping, considering it's four am." Myka replied.

"Yeah, good point."

Suddenly the silence of the early morning was pierced by the wailing of sirens coming from the left of Myka and Pete. Within minutes, cops were everywhere, putting up crime scene tap, taking pictures and for some reason, no one had interview Myka or Pete about what had happened. Myka was starting to get more concerned by the minute. It seemed as though all the local cops were waiting for someone to come and take the lead on the case. Myka was right as a few minutes later two big black SUVs rolled in and a group of six, two women and four men, got out of them. They flashed their badges and entered the crime scene.

The group split up and Myka was the first to notice the dark haired woman approach them. Pete had been blabbing on about something that happened in a comic book and Myka had completely drowned him out. She had been busy memorizing the crime scene because she had a feeling that it would come in handy later.

When the dark haired agent was within a few feet of Myka and Pete, Pete finally noticed she was there and completely shut up.

"Hi there," said the man with light brown hair to Emily. She was supposed to interview the people who had found the body and was pointed in their direction. From one look at the two of them, she could tell that the woman with dark curly hair was the more responsible one of the two. She stood with her arms crossed, surveying the scene while the man had been talking and making wild gestures with his hands, completely unaware that the woman wasn't listening to him. Emily found it odd that these two didn't seem all that distraught at finding a dead body in an alley.

"Hi, we're sorry to keep you waiting," Emily said. "I'm SSA Prentiss with the BAU," she flashed her badge. The woman nodded and the man just kept staring at her and Emily noticed that his gaze was starting to lower. Great, she thought to herself. "I'm going to need your names."

"Myka Bering," said the woman. Emily looked to the man standing next to her, who still seemed to be a bit distracted. Myka hit him in the arm and his eyes snapped back up to meet Emily's.

"Pete Lattimer," he said and extended his hand. Emily took it hesitantly and quickly let go after the appropriate amount of time.

"So can you tell me how you came upon the victim?" Emily said, trying to hurry things along.

"Well," Pete began. "We were on our way back to the B&B, when my truck -the one parked just down the road there," he pointed down the road. "Broke down. Since it's just a few minutes to the B&B, we decided to walk. Although it took a little convincing on her part," he said and pointed at an annoyed looking Ms. Bering. "I had to bribe her with Twizzlers. She was a little annoyed that we ran out of gas-" he was cut off by Myka.

"Pete?"

"Yes?" he said, still looking at Emily.

"Stop talking."

"Right."

"I'm sorry," Myka said. "You'll have to excuse my partner, he can get a bit... carried away," she finished with a glare in Pete's direction. "We were walking down the street when something caught my eye in the alley, when I turned to look at it I saw it was a body."

Emily had to admit, watching and listening to these two was quite interesting. "Okay thank you. So are you two a couple? Married?" Emily asked.

"Ha! Never!" Myka exclaimed.

"Hey!" Pete said, obviously taking offense to what Myka had just said.

"No actually we work together," she clarified.

"And what is it you do from a living?" Emily asked. These were obviously the two other people that were staying at the bed and breakfast and the team still hadn't discussed whether or not the people staying there would be suspects or not.

"Secret Service," Pete said at the same time Myka said,

"IRS."

The two looked at each other and Emily could see panic on their faces. They both looked back a Emily and Myka said,

"Secret Service," while Pete said,

"IRS."

This sent up a red flag in Emily's mind. Their story had seemed believable up until this point so now Emily was becoming suspicious. "Excuse me?" she asked. The two looked at each other again and Pete started making odd gestures with his hand that he was trying to hide behind his head but failing miserably.

"Mr. Lattimer, what are you doing?" Emily asked sceptically.

"What? Oh it's Pete, call me Pete." he said. "I wasn't doing anything," he replied and shoved his hands in his pockets.

Emily suddenly heard an odd vibrating sound coming from Myka's pocket. The woman started mumbling something she couldn't quite make out and looking around frantically.

"Artie!" she called out after spotting a shot bearded man in the crowd. "Artie!" she called again, finally getting the man's attention. He pulled out something from his bag, showed it to an officer standing by the tape and entered the crime scene. As Emily watched the man approach, she found that he looked familiar but she didn't know where she had seen him before.

"Pete, Myka! What on earth are you two doing? I told you to call me as soon as you got back!" he exclaimed.

"Hey, Artie. Yeah about that," Pete trailed off.

"I tried to call you but you weren't picking up," said Myka. It seemed as though they had forgotten that Emily was standing there. She was starting to get a little annoyed.

"Excuse me?" Emily said attempting to get their attention and the three looked over at her. "Hi, yeah, still here. Would someone mind explaining to me what the hell is going on?"

"Ah yes, I'm so sorry for the confusion..." the man named Artie said and trailed off not knowing who she was.

"SSA Prentiss," she supplied.

"Ah Agent Prentiss. My name is Artie Nielson, I'm their boss." he said referring to the two adults behind him.

"And what exactly is it you all do?" Emily asked again. If she didn't get a straight answer this time she was going to scream.

"Uh, well, what have these two told you?" Artie said. Emily sighed.

"Secret Service and or IRS. Which is it?" Emily asked exasperated.

"Well see, the town thinks we're IRS but they're actually Secret Service and I'm NSA," Artie said and they all held up their badges.

"Okay so then why are you here?" Emily was becoming even more confused by the minute. The Secret Service was supposed to protect the President but the President was nowhere near South Dakota, let alone Univille at the moment._ And what the hell did the NSA want with their case?_

"I'm afraid that's need to know Agent," Artie said.

Emily was about to say something when she was cut off by the ringing of her phone. "Don't go anywhere," she warned the three supposed secret Service agents and walked away to answer her phone.

As soon as she was gone, Artie turned to Myka and Pete. He had on a frantic look that Myka rarely saw from him.

"Artie what's going on?" she asked.

"I need you two to listen, listen very carefully to what I'm about to say," Artie whispered and look at the Warehouse agents. "Pete, are you listening to me?"

"Yes," he said tearing his eyes away from Agent Prentiss. "Yes totally."

"Okay good. This is the sixth murder to take place in the last three days. We got the SOS two days ago and this is the fourth murder to take place in town. Now Claudia and I haven't been able to figure out what it is yet but there is definitely an artifact, a very dangerous artifact involved in this." Artie whispered fiercely.

"Why didn't you call us to come back earlier then?" asked Myka. She found it strange that Artie hadn't told them about this sooner. If people were dying this quickly then they needed to find whatever was doing this and fast Myka thought to herself.

"No no no, you were busy; there wasn't much you could have done anyway. Oh! Speaking of which, do you have the head band?" Artie asked and looked from Myka to Pete who reached into his pocket to pull out the bag containing the artifact.

"Snagged and bagged," Pete said triumphantly and handed it to Artie.

Artie then took the bag and put it in his larger one. He turned around and surveyed the scene. Having the FBI in town while trying to track down the artifact was going to be a definite problem but they could do it... maybe. He watched as the group of FBI agents gathered together and started talking. This case was certainly going to need a lot more precaution and they were going to have to work much faster than usual. He wanted nothing more at that moment than to pull out the Durational Spectrometer and just see what happened but Artie knew that that would never be an option. They also weren't allowed to go anywhere as Pete and Myka Still had to give the rest of their interviews.

Agent Prentiss and another agent, a man with dark brown hair and a grim expression made their way over to Myka, Pete and Artie.

"I'm Unit Chief, SSA Hotchner," he said. "Agent Prentiss tells me that you're Secret Service. Can I ask what you're doing at my crime scene?"

"Well, we kinda found the body," said Pete.

"Right. We're sorry to have to cut this short but there's been another body found." Hotch said. "Did you see anyone else around?"

"No we were the only ones out here." Myka replied.

"Did you see anything out of the ordinary?"

Myka shook her head and the Farnsworth in her pocket started vibrating again. "Will you excuse me for a minute?" she asked and stepped away from everyone else.

"Okay well thank you for your time," Hotch said. "If we have any more questions, we'll be contacting you." Hotch and Prentiss turned to leave but Pete stopped them.

"Wait, you didn't get my number," he said and handed a card to Prentiss. "I don't have a work number, so this is only my cell." he continued in a hushed tone. "You can call me whenever. you know, maybe when this whole murderer thing-"

"Goodbye, Mr. Lattimer," Prentiss said cutting him off. As they the two walked over to their SUV, Emily shook her head.

"He didn't seem that bad," Hotch commented.

"That's usually the thought I have at the beginning of all my dates."

Prentiss and Hotch got into the SUV where Reid was already waiting in the backseat to go to their next crime scene.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Hello there readers, it's been a while. First I wanted to thank everyone for all the alerts and favouring, it just makes my day so much better every time I see one of those emails. Exams start tomorrow for me and what am I doing right now? Updating my story. That's how much I love you guys for reading. My next update might not be for a while, as this week I have exams (5 of them, oh joy) then the week after I start all new classes and I don't know if I'll get much writing done, but never fear, I certainly will try. Like before let me know if there are any errors with anything, I will fix them. I hope you enjoy :)**

**Disclaimer: they're not mine.  
><strong>

As Hotch pulled up at the next crime scene, the group of three agents allowed themselves to be hopeful. When they got the call, the cops had said they had arrested a woman who they found poking around the scene. Although a woman didn't really fit their profile, it was certainly a start.

The profilers got out of the SUV and made their way over to the car where the newest body was found. It was a woman; she was sitting in the driver's seat covered in her own blood. The car was in the owner's driveway, parked in front of the victim's house.

"This UNSUB is all over the map," Prentiss mumbled.

"That's actually true also regarding the geographic profile I constructed yesterday." Reid said. "The UNSUB doesn't seem to have a comfort zone, he, or I guess she, started in the next town over which is two hours away, he or she attacks people on the street and in their homes or near them. It's really quite weird and it's almost impossible to give an accurate profile of this UNSUB."

Emily was examining the knife wounds and noticed something that was different from the last victim.

"Hey Hotch, come take a look at this," she said and waved him over. "The slash across this victim's throat goes from right to left, but I'm pretty sure that on the victim from the alley this morning the slash went from left to right. Could our guy be ambidextrous?"

"That's a good question. I'll call the morgue and have JJ go check out the other victims," Hotch replied.

"Agent Hotchner?" Hotch and Prentiss turned around and saw that the cop standing by the car holding their suspect was waving them over. Hotch and Reid walked over while Prentiss stayed and examined the scene more before they removed the body.

"Is there a problem Officer?" Hotch asked and glanced at their suspect who was sitting in the back of a squad car. The window was rolled down and she was staring at Reid. She had beautiful, straight black hair and mysterious brown eyes.

"Yes just a small one," confirmed the officer.

"The only problem is that the bobby here won't listen to me!" butt in the suspect. She had a British accent, something Hotch, nor Reid was expecting. Hotch looked at the officer with a questioning look of his face.

"She says her name is H.G. Wells."

"I'm sorry but I don't see the problem," Hotch replied.

"H.G. Wells was an English author who died in 1946," Reid supplied. "He was famous for his work in science fiction and is referred to as 'the father of science fiction' along with Jules Verne and Hugo Gernsback. Although there was some speculation that he got his ideas from his sister Helena, it was never proven."

"He got more than just his ideas from me," H.G. grumbled as she looked around at the gathering crowd.

"Right, and you just happen to know how to time travel?" the officer asked sarcastically.

"Well, if I did, I certainly wouldn't be here, now would I?" she snapped back.

Hotch looked at Reid. "Dissociative Identity Disorder?"

"Looks like it," confirmed Reid. "You know, maybe if we wait long enough she'll return to her real identity."

"Excuse me, but _She_ is sitting right here!" H.G. exclaimed.

"I'm going to call Garcia," Hotch announced and walked a few feet away.

"You've reached your tech goddess, how may I assist you in finding your way, oh lost one?" Garcia answered cheerfully for six am.

"Garcia, we've got a suspect in custody and she's claiming that her name is H.G. Wells."

"Wait, H.G. Wells... as in the author from the 1900's?"

"That's what she says. Can you run that down for us?"

"Okay... well I don't have much on a woman, just a bunch of theories that says H.G. was indeed a woman, her brother was just how she got people to read her work. It was never proven. It says here that he died in August 1946."

"Okay, thanks Garcia," Hotch said and hung up the phone. He walked back over to the car where the suspect and Reid were having a conversation about murder.

"Do you still not believe me?" she said, changing the subject.

"No not really," Hotch replied.

"Fine. Why don't you ask her then?" H.G. said and motioned her head toward someone standing in the gathering crowd. "Claudia!" she called out suddenly. "Claudia!"

Hotch and Reid had heard that name just a few hours ago and in the crowd they saw a flash of red hair with a hint of turquoise.

"Reid you go get her, I'll see if Prentiss has found anything new," Hotch said.

Reid nodded and went in the direction Claudia had gone off in. After he scanned the crowd, he heard someone mumbling behind a car and when he looked behind it, he found Claudia talking into an odd contraption. When she saw him standing a few feet away she quickly closed it.

"You're Claudia Donovan, correct?" Reid questioned.

"That depends on who wants to know." she replied.

"Dr. Spencer Reid, I'm with the FBI."

"I had a feeling you'd say that."

"Would you mind answering a few questions?"

Claudia sighed. She knew that this was bound to happen as soon as she saw H.G. in the police car. She was in the middle of talking to Artie about what she should do when Dr. Reid had found her.

"Do these questions involve the woman who's handcuffed in the back of the police car?" she asked, already knowing the answer.

"Yes, she says you can help us identify her," Reid replied. He had had a feeling that Claudia could somehow be involved in the case from the moment they told her that they were FBI back at the Bed & Breakfast. She had been acting very strangely before and now they sort of knew why.

"What do you mean by identify? Does she not know her own name?" Claudia asked, trying to stall.

"Look, could you please just come with me?" Reid asked, getting a little annoyed.

Claudia looked from Reid to the crime scene, trying to figure out if she could make a run for it. _Probably not, they already know where I live_, she thought.

"Do I have a choice?" she asked one last attempt to get out of there and back to the Warehouse.

"No not really," Reid replied and they both made their way over to the police car H.G. was sitting in. During the time that Reid was getting Claudia, Prentiss had joined Hotch and they were talking to the suspect.

"Claudia! Thank God," H.G. exclaimed. "Will you please tell them that I'm not crazy?"

"The jury's still out on that one," Claudia mumbled under her breath.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?" Prentiss asked looking up from her notes.

"Nothing," Claudia replied quickly.

"She said, 'the jury's still out on that one'," Reid said.

"Dude, really?" Claudia said and glared at Reid who was standing between her and the police car.

"Well I could be saying the same thing to you Claudia," H.G. interjects.

"Okay that's enough," Hotch said, clearly annoyed with their antics. "Ms. Donovan, do you know the woman in the car or not?

"Do I know her? No. Do I know who she is? Yes." Claudia clarified.

"So what's her name?" Prentiss asked. "Her real name," she added for good measure.

"H.G. Wells."

The three agents look at her, clearly tired of what was going on. They all exchanged glances, each one trying to decide on whether or not Claudia was lying. Prentiss looked from H.G. to Claudia, trying to figure out if they might have escaped from a mental hospital somewhere.

"I know that look," Claudia said to Prentiss. "You think we're crazy and that we're escaped mental hospital patients," she said with a grin.

Prentiss simply looked at her, completely dumbfounded.

"Well, in your case that's sort of true," H.G. said to Claudia, which made the three FBI agents rethink the situation.

"Hey, I'm perfectly sane," Claudia replied angrily to H.G.

"Yeah, now."

"Okay, you know what? Have fun in the psych ward and just a tip, don't eat the pudding. I'm outta here," Claudia said and stormed out of the crime scene.

"Oh come on Claudia!" H.G. called after her. "Could you at least call Myka?"

Claudia's sole response was a raised middle finder in H.G. direction.

Hotch, Reid and Prentiss and shared surprised looks, unsure on how to proceed.

"Wait, Myka Bering?" Prentiss asked, recognizing the name from the earlier crime scene.

"Yes," H.G. replied.

"Prentiss go after Ms. Donovan, Reid watch her," Hotch ordered and gestured to H.G. "I'm going to call Garcia."

Emily headed off in the direction Claudia had gone in. She found it odd that all these people were connected to the case in different ways. Myka and Pete were the ones who found the body of the earlier murder victim and they had said that there wasn't anybody else around. If Emily hadn't been rushed off to the next scene she might have thought about that fact earlier. Emily caught up with Claudia just as she was turning down the next street. She didn't seem to have a car with her, although Univille was a small enough town that you didn't really need one.

"Excuse me? Ms. Donovan? Could I have a word with you?" Emily called to her.

Claudia groaned internally; Artie was going to kill her. He had specifically told her not to get involved in the case; she was just supposed to be a town's person interested in what was going on. It seemed like Artie's Law of Artifacts had certainly taken affect: the worst thing that can happen with an artifact will happen with an artifact.

"Look," Claudia snapped. "It was only for four months and I checked myself in and out. No biggie."

"Actually, I was wondering if you knew Myka Bering." Emily said consulting her notes.

"Why?" Claudia asked warily.

"Could you just answer the question?"

Claudia opened her mouth to say something but was cut off by a vibrating sound coming from her bag. Emily recognized it from earlier when she had heard it coming from Myka's pocket.

"I do," Claudia replied, while acting like she didn't hear the noise. "Why do you ask?"

"And how long have you known... Ms. Wells?" Emily asked, avoiding Claudia's question.

"Not long," was Claudia's reply. The vibrating had stopped.

"Does she have any mental conditions that you're aware of?" the older woman asked.

"There's something wrong with her that's for sure." Claudia voiced. Mentally she thought, _She's a freaking super villain, of course there's something wrong with her!_ Out of the corner of her eye, Claudia saw Pete and Myka walking down the street perpendicular to the one her and Prentiss were sanding on. Artie had probably sent them to check out the next crime scene or to find her since she wasn't answering her Farnsworth.

"Hey! There she is!" Pete exclaimed from across the street. He and Myka had been trying to find her for the last twenty minutes, since she had hung up on Artie. "Pete, can you not see that she's talking to someone?" Myka asked a little annoyed.

"Yeah, and it's Agent Prentiss. Sweet! I can work a little more of my magic on her." Pete said excitedly.

Myka rolled her eyes. "Pete, you have like _no_ chance with her."

"Says you," Pete said. He put a huge smile on his face and started to cross the street.

Myka followed reluctantly. Artie wasn't happy about how involved they'd become in the case but Myka thought that it might be better as they would be able to get more information.

"Hey Claud," Pete said and looked to Prentiss. "Are we interrupting anything?"

"Actually, yes," replied Prentiss.

Myka looked from Prentiss to Claudia. "What's going on Claudia?" she asked.

"Uh..." was all Myka received as a reply from Claudia.

"We have a suspect in custody," said Prentiss. "She seems to know Claudia and she wanted us to call you as well."

_Uh-oh_, thought Myka. There weren't many people in town that knew both Claudia and herself, that could only mean one person. Myka narrowed her eyes and looked at Claudia, in response, Claudia gave a slight nod. Mentally, Myka screamed.

Pete looked from Myka to Claudia, trying to figure out what was going on. He had no idea why everyone had stopped talking so suddenly, as he wasn't following the conversation. Pete cleared his throat and looked at Myka; he was seriously confused.

Behind them, a police car drove by. Claudia spotted it first and motioned for Pete and Myka to look at it as well. What Pete saw angered him. Sitting in the back was H.G. Wells. Prentiss' phone began to ring and she walked a few feet away to answer it, giving Pete, Claudia and Myka a chance to discuss the recent events.

Myka was the first to speak. "What happened?"

"Artie asked me to come check out the new scene," explained Claudia. "I got here and Saw a police officer putting her in the car. When the FBI got here, they went to talk to her. I guess she saw me and called me over."

"Why?" questioned Myka.

"They don't believe she's H.G. Wells, so she wanted me to tell them she was."

Myka could hear in Claudia's voice that there was more to the story. "Well what happened then?" she asked.

"Well, we started bickering about.. Well that's not really important. Anyway, so I walked away and she told me to call you," Claudia finished.

"Okay, so she must have found the scene first and started looking for clues or something when the police arrived," deduced Myka. "That's why they arrested her! So... What do we do? We can't leave her there at the station."

"Why can't we?" exclaimed Pete. He really didn't trust H.G. and prison seemed like the best place for her. She couldn't hurt anybody in there and if they put her away for the murders then the FBI would have a reasonable explanation of what happened and she would no longer be the Warehouse's problem.

"Pete, they'll probably lock her up in an asylum or something," Myka attempted to reason with him.

"Again, that's a bad thing?" he still didn't see why she was their problem; she had gotten herself into this mess.

Prentiss made her way back over to the group. Hotch had called to let her know the whole team was meeting back at the station to discuss the newest victims and latest suspect. She had told him about her theory that Claudia, Pete and Myka were all somehow connected to the case so they decided that they should come down to the station as well.

"Would you three mind coming down to the station?" Prentiss asked the group. Pete was staring at her again, so she directed her attention to Myka, hoping he would get the point that she wasn't interested.

"No, not at all," replied Myka. "We'll take our own car; we can be there in five minutes."

"Okay, thank you." Prentiss smiled and headed back around the corner to meet Hotch at the SUV.

As soon as Prentiss was out of earshot, Pete exclaimed, "What? Myks are you crazy?"

"I too am a little curious as to what's going through your mind," Claudia said sceptically.

"Guys, if can get in the station we might be able to see what they have for evidence and what they think is going on. If we get on their good side, they could help us find the artifact without them even knowing it." Myka glanced between Claudia and Pete.

"Devious, I like it," Claudia replied with a evil smile.

"I guess you have a point," Pete admitted reluctantly.

"And you know," Myka said with a shrug. "It might help to see what H.G. found."

Pete sighed and nodded. The three made their way down the street to Myka's car.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hey guys! I'm going to make this A/N short and (hopefully) sweet because I still have math homework to do before Grey's Anatomy is on and you all probably don't want to read me blabbering. I want to dedicate this chapter to the Greek god Boreas, because if it weren't for the snow day he brought on Wednesday then this chapter would not have been posted for another couple of days****. (I'm weird, I know, ignore it.) Thanks again for all your favouring and reviews, the chapters might become a little shorter since I seem to be lacking in free time. Happy reading! :)**

**Disclaimer: still not mine.  
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The Univille PD was overcrowded and a little too loud that day in Reid's opinion. They had extra officers there from the state department and the station just wasn't big enough for the BAU team, the extra officers along with the regular officers. Reid was sitting at the table, staring at a map of locations where they had found the bodies. It just wasn't making much sense to him. It seemed as though their UNSUB could be in multiple places at the same time, as most of the murders that occurred on the same night had the same approximate time of death. The UNSUB's timeline was accelerating and they had yet to come up with a profile. Hopefully the suspect they had in custody could help shed some light on what was going on. They had just brought her in about fifteen minutes ago and she was now sitting in interrogation. He, Hotch and Prentiss has gotten back ten minutes ago and they were just waiting for Morgan, JJ and Rossi to comeback from the other crime scene.

"Got anything new Reid?" Hotch asked from behind him. Reid turned in his chair to see Hotch and Prentiss standing there with coffee cups in their hands.

"No," Reid said. He turned to Prentiss. "Hey, I thought you gave up coffee."

"Desperate times call for desperate measures. Has Ms. Donovan and her... friends come in yet?" Prentiss asked and looked around.

"Who?" Reid asked. He was little confused as to who the 'friends' were that Prentiss was talking about.

"Oh, I didn't tell you?"

"No."

"Tell who what?" JJ said as she took a seat across from Reid. Prentiss sat down next to her.

"I'll explain when everyone else gets here."

"Okay," JJ replied.

As soon as everyone was seated Hotch briefed them on the newest scene. He told them about the suspect in custody and they all looked at each other, not sure what to say.

"So, how would that affect the profile?" JJ asked.

"Well, we don't really have a profile that it could affect," said Morgan. "Hotch, do you really think she has something to do with this?"

"At this point it's hard to tell. When we arrived at the scene, our initial thought was that she was lying but as Reid talked to her it seemed as though she actually believes she's H.G. Wells."

"So Dissociative Identity Disorder then?" suggested Rossi.

"That's what we think," replied Reid.

"But wait, there's more," Prentiss said with mock excitement.

All eyes went to her.

"The suspect called out to someone in the crowd while we were talking to her. Reid brought her over and they started... bickering for a lack of a better term." Prentiss pulled out a photo of Claudia from the file Garcia had faxed over and passed it around. In the photo, Claudia was a complete mess. It was taken when she had entered the psychiatric care facility.

"Do you guys remember Claudia Donovan from the Bed & Breakfast?" she continued.

"The teenager?" Rossi asked surprised as he looked at the picture.

"She's actually twenty years old. She's the one our suspect knows."

"So she knows our suspect," Rossi pondered out loud. "What were they bickering about?"

"Who's crazier," Hotch said.

"Did you bring her in then?" Rossi questioned.

Prentiss shook her head. "She ran off down the road. As she left, our suspect told her to call Myka. I caught up to her and questioned her about it. She said she had checked herself into a psychiatric care facility for four months then checked herself out. We hadn't gotten very far into the conversation when we were interrupted."

"By who?" JJ asked.

"Well this is where it gets interesting."

"You're kidding, right?" JJ said, completely bewildered how fast this case was turning around.

"No. This morning when I was interviewing the people who found the body, they had said they were Secret Service agents. The woman's name is Myka Bering."

"Wait," Morgan interrupted. "Why would the Secret Service be here?"

"We don't know," said Hotch.

"So when I was talking to Ms. Donovan," Prentiss continued. "The two agents came over, apparently they know each other and by the look of things I would say quite well. But that's when Hotch called me to say we were coming back here, so I asked them to come down to the station. Agent Bering said they would be here in five minutes but that was half an hour ago." she finished with a shrug of her shoulders.

"Well things are certainly becoming more..." Rossi started but was unable to find the right word.

"Complicated?" Morgan offered.

"Prentiss, did you get the Agent's contact information?" Rossi questioned.

Emily thought for a moment. She never got anything from Myka or Claudia but then she remembered that Pete had given her his card.

"Yeah, I think I have Agent Lattimer's cell number," Prentiss said and pulled out her notes.

"Okay, Prentiss you call him and see why they aren't here yet-" Hotch started.

"Why me?" Prentiss cut in.

"Because he gave you the number," Hotch deadpanned.

"Fine," Prentiss grumbled.

"Morgan you call Garcia, see if she can find anything on Myka Bering or Pete Lattimer. Prentiss, wasn't there a shorter man there this morning as well?"

"Uh yeah, hold on I wrote his name down here somewhere," Prentiss replied and flipped through her notes. "Artie Nielson."

"Okay, Morgan?" Hotch looked to Morgan who was on the phone.

"Got it," he replied and resumed his conversation with Garcia.

"Alright, JJ, are you ready to help me with another press release?" Hotch asked their former media liaison.

"Sure, let's do it." she said, got up and started towards the front doors of the station.

"Prentiss?" Hotch looked back, warning filling his voice.

"Yeah yeah I got it, I'll call him." Prentiss said with a sigh.

* * *

><p>Myka, Claudia and Pete were making their way down the side walk to the Police Station. They had decided to walk from Leena's since it was a nice day and Myka thought she might fall asleep in the car had they driven. It was already eight thirty AM and Myka hadn't slept in twenty four hours. When they had regrouped at Leena's earlier she had a coffee but it wasn't helping. It was surprisingly warm out for such an early morning in May and it was starting to get warmer as the sun rose higher in the sky. Artie had agreed that they should go down to the Station and try to find out what the BAU thought was going on. Artie was going to go with them but as they were about to leave, Mrs. Frederick decided to pop in unannounced as usual. She seemed to be very pissed at Artie, so Myka, Pete and Claudia bolted out of there as fast as they could. They were about ten minutes away from the station when Pete's phone rang.<p>

"Hey, you've got Pete," he answered. Myka couldn't hear who was on the other end of the line, but she had a feeling that it was Agent Prentiss. His face broke out in a grin as he glanced at Myka and her suspicions were confirmed.

"Well Agent Prentiss, are you really that eager to see me?" Pete's face suddenly dropped and paled a little.

Myka and Claudia looked at each other and giggled. Whatever Prentiss had said certainly scared Pete.

Pete cleared his throat. "Okay. We'll be there in about five minutes." he said and hung up the phone.

"Dude, what did she say to you?" Claudia questioned while holding in a laugh.

"Nothing important." Pete shook his head. "They were wondering when we would get there, so we should probably hurry up."

"Pete, I told you to stay away from her," Myka said with a smug look on her face.

"It's just a bump in the road," Pete shrugged. "Now let's hurry up because I really don't want to know if she's capable of what she just said."

Pete quickened his pace and left the two women staring after him in confusing. They caught up with him and the group finished their walk to the station in silence.

As Myka walked into the station, she noticed immediately that almost every officer turned their attention to who was walking in the doors. Myka stopped and took in the atmosphere in the station. There were officers everywhere, it was loud and busy. She could see the BAU agents sitting around a table in the left hand corner, probably discussing what to do when she, Pete and Claudia got there.

"So what's the plan?" Claudia asked Myka as she glanced around.

"Okay..." Myka said as she thought for a moment. "Claudia, I want you to try and get as close as you can to the murder board. Try to see if they have any leads on the murder weapon, that's most likely our artifact. Pete-"

"Wait a minute," Pete cut in. "Who put you in charge?"

"Artie," Myka replied.

"Oh yeah? When?"

"When you were daydreaming about Agent Prentiss," Myka said with a smug smile.

"Burn," Claudia injected.

"Fine, what do I do?" Pete mumbled.

"Try to get as much information as you can without directly asking questions. Also try to stay away from H.G., I'll handle that." Myka instructed.

Pete nodded in response and started to walk towards the table in the corner.

"Pete?" Myka called after him. He turned back around to face her. "Try to keep your foot out of your mouth."

"Got it," he said with a nod.

Myka and Claudia followed behind Pete to the table of FBI agents. Rossi was the first to notice them.

"You must be the Secret Service agents," Rossi said to them.

"Yes, I'm Agent Bering and this is my partner, Agent Lattimer," Myka said while motioning to Pete.

"I'm Agent Rossi. We just have a few follow-up questions for you. Agent Bering, would you mind coming with me?" Rossi asked as he got up and went around the table to the same side Myka was standing on.

"Sure," Myka replied with an obvious fake smile. She was getting worried; they must have noticed that she did most of the talking out of the three of them and decided to split them up.

"Great, follow me," Rossi said and headed towards the interview rooms.

Myka sent a warning glance to Pete and Claudia and followed after Rossi. He led her into a small observation room, and sitting in the interview room on the other side of the one-way glass was H.G. Wells. She was handcuffed to the table, glaring to the officer standing by the door.

_How the hell am I going to get her out of here?_, thought Myka.

"Agent Bering, do you know the woman sitting in that room?" Rossi asked while watching H.G.

Myka was at a loss as to how she should answer the question. If she said no, she could easily be caught in a lie. If she said yes, then she could become a suspect in the murders. Although with the way they've been acting, the later was probably already the case. She could see Rossi eyeing her so she needed to say something.

"I'm acquainted with her," Myka replied.

Rossi nodded. "Could you tell me her name?"

This was the question that Myka was dreading. They clearly didn't believe that her name was H.G. Wells; they thought she was crazy and if Myka told Rossi that her name was indeed H.G. Wells they would think that she too was crazy. She had tried to come up with a story on the way over but she didn't have much. Myka took a deep breath.

"Her name is Helena. Her daughter was murdered in a home invasion and she hasn't been the same ever since." Myka said with a shrug.

"Could you explain why she thinks she's H.G. Wells?" Rossi asked and watched Myka's reaction. Her facial expression never changed but her hands went from hanging at her sides to being held behind her back.

"I don't really know," Myka replied and looked at Helena. She hadn't prepared an answer to that question or really anymore questions Rossi might ask.

It was almost like Helena knew Myka was on the other side of the glass watching her because the two were suddenly holding eye contact with each other. Myka cleared her throat and looked down at her shoes. This exchange did not go unnoticed by Rossi.

"Agent Bering, um, Helena has been asking to talk to you." Rossi fumbled over using the suspect's name. "We've agreed to let you speak to her as long as I'm present in the room. Would you like to talk to her?"

Myka looked up at Rossi, weighing her options. If she went in there, she could say something to jeopardize the case for the Warehouse, but if she didn't and Helena knew something important then that could also be bad. She needed to find a way to get Helena out of custody.

"Okay, let's go in then," Myka said and turned toward the door.

Rossi went in ahead of her. As soon as Myka entered the room H.G. had a look of relief on her face.

"Myka, thank God!" Helena exclaimed. She had been sitting there for almost an hour now. When she had first arrived they had sent in Dr. Reid and Rossi to interview her but they got nowhere. Helena didn't say anything, only that she would only talk to Myka. Myka sat down in the chair across from her and Rossi took over the position by the door that the officer had vacated when Rossi and Myka had entered.

"Helena," Myka said with a nod of her head.

"You've got to get me out of here. You know I didn't do this."

"How can I be sure you didn't?" Myka asked sceptically. A look of shocked took over Helena's face.

"You've got to be kidding me!" Helena said with a sad chuckle. She looked at Rossi and lowered her voice. "Even after I saved your life and Claudia's, you think I would go and do something like this?" she hissed.

"Could you keep your voice level up please?" Rossi asked. "If you keep whispering we'll have to cut this meeting a little short."

Helena glared at Rossi and then looked back at Myka.

"Helena, they found you at the crime scene," Myka attempted to reason why she shouldn't believe her.

"Yes because I was trying to find the cause of the killings," Helena replied as if it was obvious.

"How did you know where the crime scene was?" Rossi questioned from his spot by the door. There was something these two were trying not to say, Rossi just couldn't figure out what it was.

"Well I was out walking around and..." Helena trailed off and looked at Myka. Rossi couldn't see Myka's face so he didn't know what her reaction was.

"And what?" Rossi asked and moved to stand next to the table, in between Myka and Helena. The two women's gazes never wavered from one another. Myka nodded slightly and Helena then looked up at agent Rossi.

"And..." She glanced at Myka again. "I smelled fudge."*

Myka's eyes widened a bit, clearly knowing what this meant but Rossi stared at both of them, completely confused.

"You smelled fudge?" he repeated. "Is that some kind of code?" He glanced at Myka.

"No," Myka responded first. "I have no idea what that means."

Rossi knew that this wasn't true, he just couldn't figure out what the meaning behind smelling fudge could be. He glanced between Myka and Helena once again and headed for the door. Rossi opened the door and turned back to the women at the table.

"Agent Bering, could I have a word with you outside please?" Rossi asked coldly.

"Of course," Myka replied with another fake smile plastered on her face, obviously ignoring Rossi's unhappy mood.

If there was one thing Rossi learned from the interview it was that he could not let these two in the same room again. There was something going on and they seemed to know more about it than his team. _And how the hell does fudge fit into the whole equation?_

***For those of you who don't know or remember what the smell of fudge means, it's that an artifact is usually involved. The question from Warehouse 13 in season one was "Have you recently smelled something that could best be described as fudge when there was no fudge around?" or some variation of that.**_  
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	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: I know, I know, it's taken me forever to get this up here. I've been crazy busy these last few weeks and for some reason I just couldn't find the words to write this chapter. I'm extremely depressed that Paget is leaving the show but I understand why she's doing it. The Emily/Doyle arc was what got me really interested in the show. Last summer I was going through the character arcs and just fell in love with her's so I spent my summer vacation getting caught up on CM episodes to watch this season. I found out she was leaving on Thursday and that day was horrible to begin with. **

**I'm going to write something that's really important now so please don't just ignore it! IF YOU GO TO A SCHOOL OR WORK SOMEWHERE THAT'S SUPPOSED TO BE PEANUT FREE, DON'T BRING PEANUT PRODUCTS TO THAT PLACE! You may think that it's just some stupid rule but it's not! People can die! I'm not kidding here! My friend almost died (for the 18 time since September) because someone ignored this rule. She has an anaphylactic allergy to the SMELL of peanuts. I had to hold her upright while we gave her an Epipen. So _PLEASE_ don't ignore this rule even if you think that nothing will happen!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own them, you all know that.  
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* * *

><p>Back in the bull pen, JJ watched Pete and Claudia stand awkwardly next to the table of FBI agents. Pete kept glancing at Prentiss while Claudia was outright staring at the murder board.<p>

"Why don't you two have a seat," Hotch suggested but it was more of a command. He gestured to the seat next to JJ that Rossi had vacated and the one on the other side of the table next to Reid.

Claudia quickly claimed the seat next to JJ since it had the best view of the murder board. Pete walked around the table and sat down next to Reid.

"We were hoping that you could clear up some things for us," said Hotch and opened a file that was in front of him.

"We would be happy too," Pete replied and shifted in his seat to face Hotch, who was on the other side of Reid.

Claudia smiled and nodded in agreement.

It still seemed funny to JJ that a twenty year old who was taking online university courses was following around two Secret Service agents and that they were letting her. Protocol -no matter which agency- wouldn't allow for that. So she clearly wasn't some random friend.

"Ms. Donovan," JJ said, addressing the young woman next to her. "Could you explain your connection to Agents Bering and Lattimer?"

"What do you mean?" she responded. JJ could tell that she was buying time to come up with an answer.

"Well, are you three simply friends? Do you work with them?" asked JJ, keeping her tone light.

Claudia looked at Pete, unsure of what her answer should be.

"Yes she works with us," supplied Pete. It was a tough question to answer because Claudia wasn't formally employed with any law enforcement agency.

"In what capacity?"Hotch questioned. "We know you're not an agent of any kind."

"You know, that is a very good question," was the reply from Claudia.

JJ made a mental note that the young woman was very good at buying time with her words. JJ could see Claudia's fingers moving under the table, as if she was typing on a keyboard, against her thighs.

"Would you care to answer it?" Morgan asked.

"I would love to if I knew how to label myself correctly," said Claudia.

That warranted glanced between the profilers.

"I guess you could say I'm their glorified nerd. I handle tech stuff," Claudia said, finally coming up with an acceptable answer that Artie wouldn't wig out at later.

"You mean like a Technical Analyst?" Morgan clarified.

Claudia nodded.

"And why would two Secret Service agents working in the middle of nowhere need a techie?" asked Morgan who was sitting on the other side of Claudia.

"You can never really be in the middle of nowhere. No matter where you are, you're always somewhere," Reid babbled. "You may not know where you are in the sense of geography but you're always physically somewhere. I read a study-"

"Reid," warned Hotch.

While Reid had been talking, JJ was watching Claudia's facial expressions; JJ saw anger flash in Claudia's eyes.

_What's that about?_ JJ thought.

Pete took that moment to jump back into the conversation and answer Morgan's question. "Well actually, Agent Bering and I do a lot of traveling. Claudia stays at the office and she gets us the information we need as well as does filing and stuff like that."

"Oh, okay," Morgan said and wrote something down on the pad in front of him.

"Agent Lattimer, what can you tell us about our suspect?" Prentiss asked reluctantly. Hotch had given her the task of asking them about the suspect as she had already talked to both Pete and Claudia and established a rapport.

"She's a conniving, untrustworthy-" Pete was cut off by Claudia coughing very, _very_ loudly. "You alright Claud?" He looked at her like she was crazy.

"Yeah," she cleared her throat. "Just dandy," she replied with a glare in Pete's direction.

Suddenly, both Pete and Claudia's phones beeped signalling they had a text. They both pulled out their phones and read the message. JJ quickly glanced at the screen of Claudia's phone and saw the message was from Myka. It read, _"There's definitely something going on here. She smelled fudge. BE NICE!" _JJ looked to Morgan who had done the same thing as her.

_Fudge?_ JJ mouthed. Morgan replied with a shrug.

"Wait," Reid said, something dawning on him. "Did you meet H.G. in a professional or personal fashion?"

JJ looked at Hotch. She couldn't believe they had yet to ask the mysterious trio that. She looked at Pete expectantly.

"Professionally," he replied, his emotions now seemed to be in check.

JJ nodded but didn't quite believe what he had said.

"Can you tell us how you became acquainted?" Hotch inquired.

"Nope." Pete shook his head. "It's classified, sorry," he said with a shrug.

JJ could tell that Hotch was starting to get frustrated. They weren't getting anything out of these two; hopefully Rossi was doing a better job with Agent Bering.

"Okay," Morgan said slowly. "Do you think she's capable of something like this?"

Pete stared at the table for a long moment before answering.

"Possibly," he responded tersely.

"What do you mean by possibly?"

"Well I can't really explain it. Again," Pete said and raised his hands in a surrendering manner. "It's classified. But I can tell you that you should definitely not trust her."

JJ glanced at Claudia who was still glaring at Pete.

"Claudia," JJ said hesitantly. "Do you think she would do this?" Claudia looked at her in surprise; clearly she wasn't expecting anyone to ask her opinion on the topic.

"You two just asked two very different questions," she replied and looked between Morgan on her right and JJ on her left. "_Could_ she do it and _would_ she do it would both warrant different answers. Now, I think that she has no reason to commit these murders, but she very well could."

"Claudia!" Pete burst out and stood up, sending his chair flying backwards and whacking the murder board. "Why would you say that? You know very well she would do something like this! She has no other reason for being here other than to torment us!"

"You're kidding right?" Claudia stood up as well. "Pete, if that's true, then she wouldn't have saved my life! She wouldn't have saved Myka's either! She has nothing left besides the warehouse Pete! I may not trust her completely but I owe her my life! She wouldn't do this!"

The two continued to argue as the BAU agents sat in a stunned silence. JJ was trying to catch as much of the argument as she could but some of it wasn't making any sense.

"Hey! Hey! Shut up you two!" JJ looked to her left to see the speaker was Myka. Rossi was standing behind her looking as confused as JJ felt.

"What the hell are you two arguing about?" she said in a quieter voice but it was just as fierce.

Pete and Claudia looked as if they had been caught with their hands in the cookie jar. They glanced at each other, neither one wanted to answer.

"I apologize for their outburst," Myka said addressing the FBI agents. "We should go."

Pete quickly walked around the table and headed for the door, while Claudia took another look at the murder board then made her way out.

Myka looked at Hotch, nodded politely and quickly followed her team out.

JJ, along with the rest of the team, sat there staring at the door.

"What just happened?" Rossi was the first to speak.

"I really don't know," Reid replied.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Hey *tentative wave* Thank you for sticking with me, I know I don't update as frequently as I should, but I'm trying to change that! I've been crazy busy the last few weeks so I haven't had much time to write anything. However, this week is March break so I have the whole week off! When I haven't been babysitting or doing other stuff I've been writing (so basically when I should have been sleeping I've been writing). I got a nasty headache the morning after writing this chapter, so I hope it was worth it and you enjoy it. :)**

* * *

><p>"How did it go?" Artie asked as Myka entered the warehouse and slammed the door behind her.<p>

_How did it go?_ Myka wondered. She grimaced and sat down in a chair.

"That bad huh?" Artie said with a sad smile and turned to Pete. "What did you do?"

"Why do you assume that it had something to do with me?" Pete responded and sat down across the table from Myka. She glared at him.

"Well she's only like this when you do something," Artie said and pointed at Pete. "So what happened?"

Pete cleared his throat and glanced at Claudia, who pulled up a chair and sat by the computer next to Artie.

"Well... Claudia and I may have had a... small spat," Pete confessed.

"Small?" Myka exclaimed in disbelief. "Pete, I could hear you in the next room."

"Okay so maybe it wasn't small but-" Pete was cut off by Myka.

"But nothing. You shouldn't have let your emotions get in the way Pete. If they weren't suspicious of our involvement before, they certainly will be now."

"What did you two argue about?" asked Artie.

"H.G." Pete replied and looked down guiltily at his hands.

"Well as long as you didn't argue in front of the FBI agents..."

Myka saw Artie's face fall as he looked around the room. She knew he was mad and they were in for another lecture. She decided to wait to mention the conversation she'd had with Rossi after they left the interrogation room.

"Wait. _Wait._ Please tell me you didn't." He got silence as a response. "I specifically told you to not, _to not_ talk about anything warehouse related in front of them! Do you know what you two could have done? What did you say? Exactly?"

"Well it started out about whether or not we thought H.G. was capable of being the killer," Pete said hesitantly and glanced at Claudia.

Myka turned around and followed Pete's gaze; Claudia was typing away on her laptop. _What is she looking for? _Myka wondered.

"Alright then what?" Artie said impatiently.

"Uh..." Myka could tell Pete didn't want to answer the question. "We... Uh..."

"Pete, spit it out!" Myka snapped.

"I might have said something about her being bronzed for one hundred and ten years okay?" he admitted.

"What?" Artie looked like he wanted to kill Pete.

"It was an accident!" Pete said defensively. "And Claudia wasn't helping matters either, she was yelling stuff too."

"Yes, but I didn't say anything that would jeopardize the warehouse or this case, Dummy."

Myka looked at Claudia who had remained silent up until then. Claudia was still tapping away intently on her computer.

"Pete, are you a complete moron or something?" Artie yelled. "They'll certainly look into what you said because it made no sense to them and that's what they do. They'll start digging around your file, well, probably all our files, and come sniffing around."

"Look will you all relax?" Pete pleaded. "Even if they did catch anything we said, it's not like they're going to know what it means or be able to find out."

"Yeah, well you try explaining that logic to Mrs. Fredrick."

Pete fearing that she was behind him turned around in his chair.

"She's not here Pete," Myka commented.

"Ah-ha!" Claudia burst out triumphantly which caused Myka, Pete and Artie to turn in her direction.

"What are you doing Claud?" Myka said as she got up and walked over to stand on Claudia's left side.

"Well when Agent Morgan asked what I did for a job, I said I was a glorified nerd. He then used the term 'Technical Analyst' and it made me wonder how he knew about that type of job. So I did some digging on their team and found that they have a technical analyst who works for them named Penelope Garcia."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Artie asked, clearly the point was completely lost on him.

"She's saying that she could try to hack into their database to see what kind of information they have," Myka supplied. "Right?"

"Sort of." Claudia replied. "They most likely don't keep much information regarding open cases on their computers but I could see what this Garcia chick has searched recently. It might give us an idea on who they're suspecting and what they think the murder weapon might be. I could also check for the Coroner's reports."

"That's a great idea!" Myka smiled brightly at Claudia then turned to Pete. "Don't you think so Pete?"

"...I guess so..." Pete replied bitterly.

"Did you guys actually accomplish anything that could help us find the artifact?" Artie questioned, changing the topic.

"All I got from Helena was that she smelled fudge before she came across the bodies. That's why she was there when the police arrived," Myka said with a shrug. She still didn't think it was the best time to tell them that Rossi no longer trusted them because of the whole fudge thing.

"I saw a picture of some kind of fancy knife on their board," Claudia replied sounding hopeful while tapping away on her computer.

"A knife," Artie mumbled. "Of course! Why didn't I think of that sooner?"

"You think that could be our artifact?" Pete asked sceptically.

"It might be..." Artie replied as he turned back to the warehouse computer and started a search.

"Wait, so you're saying that there's a knife out there that kills people, and you haven't snagged it yet?" Pete said in disbelief.

"Yes more than one actually," Artie replied.

Myka's jaw dropped; she couldn't believe that either."Artie, isn't that a little dangerous?"

"They haven't been a problem yet so... Not really." Artie replied with a shrug.

Myka sighed and shook her head. Sometimes Artie's logic just never made sense to her.

"Alright, so does that mean it's one person who's doing all the killings with the help of an artifact, or is it the artifact controlling a person... Somehow..." Myka pondered. The timeline of the murders were all too close for it to be the same person, but she couldn't figure out how the artifact could kill people by itself.

"As soon as I can identify it then I will let you know," Artie said.

"Okay then," Myka said, drawing out the first word.

"Now Claudia," Artie addressed the girl with her face glued to the screen in front of her. "You said you saw a picture of a knife?"

"Yepperonie Gramps," Claudia replied without taking her eyes off her laptop.

"Wha-" Artie stammered. "Ju- uh, don't call me that. What kind of image was it?"

"What do you mean?" Claudia asked, obviously confused as to what he wanted to know.

Myka was confused as well.

"Was it hand drawn?" Artie barked. "An actual picture taken by a camera? Just an outline done on a computer?"

"I think it was just an outline done on the computer."

"You think or you know?"

"Okay, Dude, settle down," Claudia said, finally looking over at Artie. "I know. We know they don't have the murder weapon, but I thought it was odd that they couldn't identify it."

"So what does that mean?" Pete asked.

"The knife must be specially made," Myka mused. "It's not some generic knife in one of their systems. It must be old then too."

"Yes, very good," Artie responded.

Myka smiled with the relief of finally having a lead. Things were looking up for them, or so it seemed.

"Hey Claudia, what are you doing?" Pete asked and glanced at her screen. Myka followed his gaze and saw the computer screen was taken up by some kind of code.

"I found the BAU's technical analyst's computer, so now I'm trying to hack her system."

"Ah, I see," replied Pete. The computer then started making odd beeping noises, causing Claudia to turn back to it.

"Oh man," Claudia mumbled.

"What is it?" Myka asked concern evident in her voice.

"This is no ordinary FBI computer. The security on this system is amazing."

"Can you still get into it?" Myka asked sceptically.

"Duh, I got in here didn't I?"

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><p><strong>AN: I hope to start updating this story once a week (key word there is hope). I've already started on the next chapter and I need your opinions on this: Who do you think is a better hacker, Claudia or Garcia?**

**Thanks :)  
><strong>


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: So I've kept my word, it's been a week and I'm updating it again! Thanks for all your opinions on who's the better hacker. Some of you might not be happy with this chapter but I have a plan to make it all better. I've finally chosen a day to update on once a week and I've picked Monday, but I won't be able to have the next chapter ready for the 19th because I don't have enough time to write the chapter, so the next one will be up on the 26th. Happy reading :)**

**Disclaimer: they're not mine and you know that.  
><strong>

Garcia sat in her brightly coloured lair, talking with her team via webcam. They were currently trying to scrounge up a profile to give to the locals.

"Reid were you able to come up with a geographic profile?" Hotch questioned from somewhere Garcia couldn't see.

"Well, the first two murders took place in the next town over on the same day, then for some reason our UNSUB came here to Univille. This town isn't really large enough of find a comfort zone for our killer, plus the UNSUB just left the bodies where he killed them." Reid said.

"Okay, so why don't we look at the timeline," Morgan suggested.

"The first murder took place at night in the victim's home, the woman lived alone and there was no evidence of a sexual assault," Prentiss stated. "Then about twelve hours later a second victim, a man this time, was murdered in broad daylight on the street."

"And nobody saw anything?" JJ sighed.

Garcia saw Prentiss shake her head.

"Did you try security cameras Garcia?" JJ asked and leaned into her line of sighed.

"Sorry my lovelies but there aren't any to be checked," replied Garcia feeling guileful.

"It's fine Garcia," Rossi responded. "So then our UNSUB waits two days and comes here and commits three murders, all of the victims male. What would make him move towns? There must be a stressor somewhere."

"Well that must be one hell of a stressor," Prentiss voiced. "Because on that night he killed two men in the street and one more in their home. Then again last night; one man on the street and one woman in her car."

"He certainly doesn't discriminate based on gender or age, though all the victims are Caucasian," JJ deduced.

"And there was no forced entry at any of the victim's homes either," Morgan added.

"Why don't we figure out the things we do know?" Hotch suggested.

"Well he's obviously a psychopath," JJ started off.

"He doesn't seem to take a trophy," Prentiss added.

"Or have a signature," Rossi spoke.

"Wait a minute," Garcia butt in. "I thought you said you had a female suspect in custody?"

"We do," Morgan confirmed.

"Okay I know that I may not be as tired as the rest of you but I'm a little confused here," Garcia voiced. "Why do you keep calling the UNSUB a 'he'?"

"Oh, sorry Baby girl," her Chocolate Adonis said and scrubbed a hand over his face. "We don't think that she's the one doing the actual killings, but there's definitely something going on there. They all keep acting so... unusual."

"Oh you mean our delightful friends, the Secret Service agents?" Garcia clarified.

Garcia received a chorus of agreements and an eye roll.

"Alrighty then. Please continue my fearless warriors." Garcia nodded to the agents she could see-Prentiss, Morgan, JJ and half of Reid.

"With the home invasions, there was no forced entry," Rossi said. "So maybe our victims knew the killer."

"It's a small town so that's very probable," Reid agreed.

"Did you find any connections with all of our victims Garcia?" Hotch asked her.

"There are no personal ties to each other, other than living in the same town. It doesn't appear that our first two vics from Feather Head knew the five from Univille. I did all the digging I could and even though they didn't know each other, they all lived the same way; alone. Victims three, five and seven were from out of town but have live in Univille for at least five years." Garcia replied while once again checking for connections.

"Anything else Baby girl?"

"None of them had any pets, if that helps," Garcia said timidly.

It wasn't unusual that none of their vics had any connections with each other, but she still felt bad that she couldn't find anything. They had no new leads even with the two latest victims. Even though Garcia wasn't a profiler, she knew there was something wonky going on with this case.

"So the home invasion and knowledge that our vics live alone would suggest an organized offender," JJ proposed.

"Right," Prentiss confirmed. "But on the other hand, the blitz attacks, compulsive kills on the street would also suggest a disorganized offender."

"So basically the only thing we know for sure is that the UNSUB's weapon of choice is a knife -that we can't identify- and that his timeline is accelerating," Morgan said frustrated and threw his pen onto the table. However the pen didn't stop when it hit the table, it bounced off the wood and smacked right into the computer screen they were talking to Garcia through.

"Morgan!" Garcia squeaked. She imagined it looked as if he had hit her in the face with the pen, and by the looks on the other agents faces, her suspicions were confirmed. "Baby you know the rules; anywhere but the face. I'd be no one if I didn't have my looks," she added slyly.

That put her team over the edge; they all started laughing uncontrollably. Garcia even swore she caught a glimpse of a rare Hotch smile.

Through all the laughter, Garcia never heard the beep that emanated from one of her many babies. Suddenly the webcam shut down and Garcia gasped. She glanced at a screen to her left and saw that someone was trying to break through one of her many firewalls.

"No, no, no, no, no," Garcia said defiantly as if that would stop the hacker. Her phone rang which made Garcia jump.

"Hey PG." It was Prentiss. "What happened?"

"Someone's trying to get into my system," Garcia said in a panicked voice.

"Can you tell who it is yet?" Hotch asked.

Garcia fingers immediately started flying across her keyboard. The person hacking into her system had already gotten past most of her easy firewalls and they were now up against some of the more difficult ones Garcia had installed.

"Not yet," Garcia replied to Hotch's question. "I can try and put a trace on their system but they're bouncing off so many proxy servers that I don't know their original location."

"Who would want to hack into Garcia's system?" Rossi asked no one in particular.

"Who would be stupid enough to?" Morgan countered.

Garcia didn't bother to listen to the rest of the conversation; she needed to focus of the threat to her babies. The unknown hacker didn't get through the next firewall fast enough, so Garcia was able to start a trace on them. Just as she was almost done with the trace, her screens went black.

Garcia's fingers froze and she looked rapidly from one screen to the next. All of them black.

"Okay, this Garcia woman is a technical genius!" Claudia exclaimed.

"How so?" Pete inquired, completely lost as to what was going on.

"You wouldn't get it and I don't have time to explain it." Claudia shrugged.

"She's got a point there," Myka scoffed.

"Hey!" said Pete.

"Enough you too," Artie snapped at them. "Claudia what are you doing? Don't run that through there! It's a trap." He pushed Claudia out of the way and started typing away on the keyboard.

"Excuse me! I know what I'm doing!" she defended from her chair a few feet away. She got up and ran back to her computer. She tried to shove Artie away from her computer with no avail, he wouldn't budge.

"Hey, what are you..." Artie glanced at Claudia. "Stop that!" he said and pushed her away with his elbow.

"No you stop that. This is my computer," Claudia replied and started swatting Artie's hands away from the keyboard.

"Hey no don't press that!" Artie exclaimed.

Artie and Claudia both froze as the laptop, along with the warehouse's main computer started beeping frantically.

"Oh now you've done it," Claudia remarked.

Artie moved over to the warehouse computer and starting muttering.

"Artie, don't touch anything I can fix this," Claudia said.

He ignored her.

"Artie!" Claudia snapped.

"Okay, okay," he surrendered. After a few moments listening to the clicking of the keys, Artie asked timidly, "What are you doing?"

"She was trying to put a trace on me so I locked her out of her own system."

"Well I get that, but is taunting her really necessary?" Artie queried.

"In case you haven't noticed, it's kind of my thing," Claudia shot back.

Garcia sat dumbfounded, staring at her Screens.

"They locked me out," she said, the fact sinking in. "They locked me out," she repeated more angrily.

Suddenly, the screen in front of her flashed and a word appeared on it.

"Knock, Knock," it said.

"Oh no you did not!" Garcia growled.

She couldn't just sit there while some over cocky hacker poked around in her system. Just as she was about to regain control of her system, the computer screens came back on. But instead of Garcia controlling the mouse, it was the hacker.

"Oh you little devil! As soon as I find you, you are so-" Garcia was interrupted by Hotch.

"Did they get in Garcia?"

'Yes Sir and they completely hijacked my system." Garcia pouted.

"Can you see what they're doing?" he asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"I know you have a pen, so get some paper and write down what they're looking at," Hotch instructed.

Garcia was confused at first but the realization soon dawned on her.

"Good idea there Boss man. If I see what they're looking at I might be able to figure out who it is," Garcia said excitedly.

"Let us know what you find," Hotch said before hanging up.

Garcia stared intently at her screens. At the moment, the hacker didn't seem to know what they were looking for. It bugged her to no end that they had gotten into her system and then they didn't even have the decency to know what they were after. Garcia grumbled to herself as she watched them go through her recent searches, stopping when they got to the part of the murder weapon.

"Now why would you be looking at that?" Garcia said out loud, even though no one was going to answer.

She quickly scribbled down the links that the hacker opened then watched as they moved on to other things. Whatever they were looking for it seemed like they couldn't find it. Finally the coroner's reports popped up on the screen and the hacker stopped what they were doing. Garcia could imagine some sick and twisted killer reading over the reports, living over the murders again and again. Garcia shivered at the thought and quickly wrote down that the hacker looked at the reports. The hacker started flipping from one report to another.

Garcia got an idea of how she could find the hacker's IP address and energetically set to work.

"Garcia, what did you find?" Hotch asked her. There was no 'Hello' or any other form of greeting; there was no time for that.

"Well, I did what you said to do and a little more," she said excitedly. "I got back into my system and but a trace on the hacker. I'm running back through all the proxies as we speak."

"Good. Did you see what they were looking for?"

"Yes indeedy. First they checked out our research on the murder weapon," Garcia paused waiting for the comments of her team.

Sure enough Morgan said, "If it was our UNSUB, why would he do that?"

"Maybe to see if we had any leads?" JJ suggested.

"Alright, what else did the hacker look at?" Hotch said, wanting to keep the information coming.

"They looked at the coroner's reports. Like I could literally see them comparing the reports."

"So maybe the hacker's not our UNSUB," Rossi stated. "I don't see why he would go to so much trouble just to relive the murders."

"That's a valid point," Hotch agreed. "Did they look at anything else?"

"Surprisingly no," Garcia replied.

"Okay, so how long were they in your system Baby Girl?" Morgan questioned.

"Eighteen minutes and thirty-seven seconds," Garcia admitted. She hated every second of those eighteen minutes and thirty-seven seconds. She found it was a good method of torture for her.

Morgan whistled in response. "Okay Garcia, thanks for taking one for the team."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what are you guys thinking?"

"It's probably not our UNSUB," Hotch stated. "So who else would want information on this case?"

"What about someone working with Wells?" JJ asked. "Maybe they want to see if we have anything on her?"

"Well we still have forty three hours to charge her with something," Prentiss said.

"Right. Rossi why don't you go see what our suspect has to say about this?" Hotch instructed.

Garcia heard no response so she imagined the two had obliged and left the room.

"Thanks Garcia," Hotch said. "We'll keep you updated."

With that Hotch hung up the phone and left Garcia to track the Hacker.

"I will find you!" she said with a fierce determination in her voice.


	8. Chapter 8

Helena pulled at the handcuff keeping her attached to the table. If she had a pin she could have easily broken out of them. Although she didn't mind the solitude; she was perfectly comfortable being alone with her thoughts. It was the possibility of someone watching her through the one-way glass window that bugged her. She found that if you stared at a certain spot in the window long enough you could sometimes catch a glimpse of movement from the other side.

Helena heard the door click and looked up next to the right of the window to see Agent Rossi and Prentiss entering the room. Rossi sat down at the table in front of her, while Prentiss stood with her arms crossed in front of the window facing Helena.

"Ms. Wells," Rossi greeted her with a smile. "Would you mind if we asked you a few more questions?"

"Well it's not like I can refuse, now can I?" she replied flatly and shook her hand cuffed wrist.

"Good point," Rossi agreed.

"Ms. Wells," Prentiss interrupted. "What were you doing at the crime scene this morning?"

Helena groaned. "Have we not been over this already? I told you people that I just happened to be walking by and saw the blood. I went over to see what happened."

"Then why did they find you going through the car our victim was in?" Prentiss questioned.

"I was looking for a cell phone."

"A cell phone?" Prentiss repeated in disbelief.

"Yes, you know, one of those devices everyone carries around attached to their hip?"

"I'm well aware of what they are. I just can't believe that you don't have one, considering everyone carries them around," Prentiss quipped.

"Well, I-" Helena started, but was interrupted by Prentiss.

"In fact, you had almost nothing on you when they brought you in. No ID, wallet or any cash, no keys to a house or car. Can you tell me why that is?" she said with a raised eyebrow.

"As I was saying, I don't have a cell phone; call me old fashioned. The reason I don't have any keys on my person is because the building I live in requires a code to get into, no keys involved. I was in a very bad mood when I left; I forgot to grab my bag. I was just going for a walk, trying to clear my head," Helena finished, hoping to get Prentiss off her back.

"Really? Because we couldn't find any record of you anywhere." Prentiss moved forward and leaned on the side of the table next to Rossi. "No bank accounts, credit cards, and no residence listed under your name."

Helena sighed and directed her next words to Rossi.

"Is this really necessary? I've told you everything I know. And I am not involved."

Rossi glanced at Prentiss. "Could I talk to you for a minute?" he asked her and they walked over to the corner by the door. They started talking to each other in hushed tones so Helena couldn't hear them.

They were clearly playing good cop-bad cop, hoping Helena would slip up and make a mistake with her story. A mistake was something she definitely couldn't afford, not if she wanted to get back in the god graces of The Regents.

Rossi came back over and sat in front of Helena, a serious look on his face. "Helena, we're prepared to offer you a deal. We know you're working with a partner, so if you give us a name we'll tell the DA you co-operated."

"But I'm innocent!" cried Helena, completely exasperated. She was getting very annoyed and a little angry at them now. "You're in here questioning me while the killer is out there. You're wasting your time and mine!"

"Alright," Rossi said slowly. "How about you just answer our questions so you can get out of here faster?"

"Fine," Helena grumbled. "But no questions you've already asked because I've already told you my answers." Helena glared at Prentiss who was still standing in the corner.

"Okay, well we've got some new questions anyway," Prentiss replied and walked back over to the table, ignoring the look she was getting from Helena.

"What did you mean when you said you smelled fudge at the crime scene?" asked Rossi.

"Just that," Helena replied with a shrug. "I smelled fudge."

"What's the significance of it?" Prentiss clarified. "It must be important since that's what you told Agent Bering when she was in here."

"I told her because she knows I'm not crazy and she knows that I wouldn't do something like this. The explanation of smelling fudge wouldn't sound odd to her coming from me because she knows I'm not crazy..." Helena was rambling and she knew it.

"Well Agent Bering may think you're innocent but I don't know about the rest of your friends," Rossi stated.

"What are you talking about?" Helena was growing uneasy. The only other people that the BAU would have talked to were Pete and Claudia. Helena wasn't really sure about what Claudia thought of her after she saved Claudia's life but it couldn't have been that she was a killer. Helena also knew for a fact that Pete really didn't trust her, or like her for that matter.

"Agent Lattimer believes that you could very well be committing these murders," Prentiss informed her. "And Claudia seems to think that you could be committing them but you aren't."

"Of course he does," Helena mumbled. "Although I don't see why, since I never actually did anything to him. It was just the circumstances we met under."

"And what were those circumstances?" Prentiss questioned.

Helena thought for a moment. Either the agents really didn't know or they were testing her to see if she would give them the same answer as Pete had given them. She had no way of knowing what Pete had told them though, so she decided to just keep her mouth shut.

"Ms. Wells? I thought we came to an agreement that you would answer our questions?" Rossi asked.

"I believe I'm not at liberty to discuss how we met," Helena took a chance and said. From the look of disappointment on Prentiss' face, Helena could tell that what she said was near the answer Pete had given them.

"Okay, fair enough," Rossi said. "Ms. Wells, how well do you know Claudia Donovan?"

"I'm acquainted with her. Why?"

"You saved her life," Prentiss pointed out.

How the hell did they know about that? Helena thought.

"I just happened to be the only one who knew what to do..." she replied.

"Okay," Rossi said. "Do you know how... Technically gifted she is with computers?"

Helena stared blankly at Rossi for a few moments. "I apologize. I don't understand your question."

"Is she a hacker?" Prentiss snapped.

"I don't know," Helena snapped back at Prentiss. Helena knew very well that Claudia was a very gifted hacker. MacPherson had filled her in on all the important things about the current warehouse agents before she had killed him. She had to keep the BAU away from the warehouse though so they could find the artifact. "I don't think she's that good. I mean really, she's only, what? Twenty years old? How would a girl her age even have the training to be a hacker?"

Prentiss sighed and started pacing around the small room. She seemed to be much more irritable than she was this morning.

"Why does that even matter?" Helena asked. She got no response from either agents and made the assumption that Claudia had hacked something, or that they got hacked and had no other suspect in mind. "Right, well are those all the questions you have for me?"

"We were also hoping that you could clear something up for us," Rossi replied.

"And what would that be now?"

"Agent Lattimer said something that makes absolutely no sense to us," Prentiss started. She was now pacing behind Helena, so she had to watch Prentiss in the window to see her. "Can you tell us what it means to be bronzed for one hundred and ten years?"

Bloody hell! Pete is a complete idiot! Helena remained calm, that was the only way for her to get through this. She was going to murder Pete once she got out, that is if someone else hasn't already beaten her to it.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," she said and shook her head.

"You took longer to answer the question," Rossi stated."Why is that?"

"Because I was trying of make sense of the question," Helena lied.

"So you really don't know?" Prentiss came around and stood next to Rossi. "Because I find that very hard to believe. Just like the rest of your story."

They were interrupted by Agent Hotchner opening the door. "Rossi, could I talk to you for a minute?" he asked.

Rossi nodded, got up and went out into the observation room with Hotchner.

Prentiss let her question drop and turned to the window. She stared at it for a moment then Helena heard her curse under her breath.

"Are you alright Agent Prentiss?" Helena asked her.

"I'm fine. Why do you ask?" Prentiss questioned suspiciously.

Helena shrugged in response.

Rossi and Hotch came back into the room and Rossi uncuffed Helena from the table.

"Ms. Wells you're free to go," Hotch informed her.

"Really?" Helena glanced from Hotch to Rossi, who both nodded. "And why is that?"

"We got an order from the higher ups," Hotch said and motioned to the door.

Mrs. Fredrick had silently entered the room without anyone noticing. She was standing next to Prentiss and it looked like Prentiss didn't even know she was standing there.

"Ms. Wells," Mrs. Fredrick addressed her. "How nice to see you again."

At the sound of a voice to her left, Prentiss literally jumped a good two feet to her right.

"Mrs. Fredrick, what a lovely surprised," Helena said with a fake smile.

"I should hope so," Mrs. Fredrick replied. "Now if you'd please come with me." Mrs. Fredrick turned and left the room. Helena trailed close behind her.

Helena was quite shocked; she wasn't expecting Mrs. Fredrick -let alone- anyone to bail her out. They both walked out the police station, leaving the confused FBI agents behind them and into Mrs. Fredrick's waiting car.

* * *

><p>Emily pulled her hair into a loose pony tail and sat down heavily on a chair. The rest of her team was in the break room looking for lunch so she allowed herself to drop the mask she had been wearing since she got back. Emily was definitely over-compensating for her time away and the worst part was that she knew she was doing it. She just wanted things to be like they were before her 'death' but she knew that would never happen, so she was bound and determined to get it as close as possible. She propped her elbows up on the table in front of her and dropped her head into her hands. She was running on very little sleep, an empty stomach and bad coffee, something she could normally deal with but she was also getting a migraine. Almost the entire time they had been interviewing Wells she couldn't see out of her left eye and now the nausea was starting to kick in. Pretty soon her head would be pounding and the florescent lights and noise level in the police station certainly didn't help matters.<p>

"Hey Em, you okay?" JJ said from her left.

Emily opened her eyes, straightened up and forced the bile back down her throat. "Yeah, I'm fine," she lied. "Just a little tired."

JJ looked at her wearily; Emily knew she wasn't convinced. "You sure about that? You look a little flushed," she remarked.

Emily cleared her throat and started drumming her fingers on the table. "Yeah," she replied and forced a smile.

JJ studied Emily for a long moment before glancing down at her dancing fingers.

"Claudia Donovan was doing that earlier. Why did we eliminate her from our list of possible suspects?" JJ asked a little too loudly for Emily's taste.

"What?" Emily asked confused and stared at her friend with a blank look. She hadn't been listening to a word JJ had said.

"Claudia was doing that when she was here earlier against her thighs," JJ explained. Emily continued to stare at her blankly.

"It looked like she was typing on a keyboard, and she did say she was a Technical Analyst," JJ continued.

"But Wells said that she doesn't have the skills to hack Garcia," Emily reminded JJ. She was hit by another wave of nausea and quickly looked down and closed her eyes.

"Were there no behavioral clues to say that Wells was lying? Because at this point, it wouldn't surprise me if she was," JJ replied. "Are you sure you're alright?" she asked again, the concern evident in her voice.

Emily swallowed hard and met her friend's worried blue eyes. "Yeah I'm just not feeling too good. It'll pass," she said with a wave of her hand. "Wells is one damn good liar because I didn't notice anything. Rossi might have, he was closer to her than I was. Although if she really is crazy then it will be hard to tell when she's lying and when she's not. I will say that there's definitely something off about that whole group and they're hiding something. So maybe it was Donovan who hacked Garcia."

"Okay. I'm going to go ask Rossi then tell Hotch our theory," JJ said and with that was gone back to the break room.

Emily took the opportunity to quickly make her way to the restroom. She locked herself in the stall furthest from the entrance and leaned her forehead against the cool metal of the door. She didn't care about how unsanitary that might have been, just as long as she had a moment of peace. The bile rose again in her stomach and this time she didn't push it back down. She turned around and emptied the contents of her stomach into the toilet before her. After flushing the toilet, she sat down and leaned against the wall, enjoying the feeling that came right after the nausea but before the headache began. She felt fine but she knew the feeling would soon pass.

Emily had no idea how long she had been sitting there like that before JJ came in looking for her. It was probably only a matter of minutes but to Emily it felt like hours. JJ knocked on the stall door.

"Emily? You in there?" she asked softly.

"Yeah, just give me a second," Emily replied.

Emily stood up slowly, hoping to prevent getting dizzy but still she felt herself sway as she reached for the lock. She opened the door and was face to face with JJ.

"What's wrong?" JJ asked her. "And don't just say you're fine, because you're not."

"JJ," Emily warned feebly and brushed past her to the sink. Emily washed her hands and face all the while avoiding the gaze of her worried friend.

"Emily," JJ began."You're not Wonder Woman, you can take some time off if you need to. Especially if you're sick, Hotch would understand."

"I have a migraine," she confessed. "I'll take some ibuprofen and be fine in an hour or so."

JJ shook her head. "Em, you look terrible. You need to go get some sleep."

Emily tried to protest but JJ put up a hand to stop her. "I'm going to get Hotch to drive you back to the Bed & Breakfast. You're going to get some sleep then hopefully some food and come back ready solve this case."

"No, really I'm-"

JJ gave Emily a look that not only scared the hell out of her but also told her to stop talking. It was probably a look she gave Henry which was why she was so good at it. Emily sighed in defeat and followed JJ back out to the bullpen.

Emily watched as Hotch and JJ conversed, occasionally glancing her way. Hotch nodded and made his way over to Emily.

"Do you need to take anything back with you?" Hotch asked. "Aside from case files because you're not bringing any with you," he added as an afterthought.

Once again Emily tried to protest but Hotch stopped her. "Prentiss, you're running yourself into the ground; you need some rest. If you bring them back to the Bed & Breakfast with you then you won't get any rest at all."

"Fine," Emily grumbled. She knew he had a point; it just bugged her that he knew she would do that.

"Alright, let's go," he said, leading her out the doors.

The two got into the SUV in silence. Hotch turned on the radio, Emily cringed and quickly turned it off.

"Oh sorry," he said. "How's your head?"

"Not too bad," she lied.

"Prentiss?" Hotch questioned with a raised eyebrow.

Emily sighed.

_Since when did he become so good at knowing when I'm lying? _

_ He's a profiler you dumb ass, of course he can tell. _

_ Well clearly he's gone against the rule of not profiling team members._

Emily's thoughts were interrupted by Hotch. "Prentiss? Are you okay?" he asked. She could hear the concern in his voice.

"Yeah it just feels like a herd of elephants are tap dancing in my head," she replied with a weak chuckle.

Hotch remained silent for a few seconds. "If you want to take the day and just stay in your room-"

"I'll be fine in an hour or so," Emily cut him off. There was a little more edge in her voice than she intended.

"If you're having a bad day, you can tell me. I won't think any less of you." He glanced in her direction.

"Thanks Hotch," Emily said reluctantly in a small voice. "I know."

They arrived at their destination and Hotch turned off the SUV.

"Do you want me to come in with out?" he asked tentatively.

"No thank you. I'll be fine," Emily replied and got out of the vehicle.

Emily opened the door to Leena's Bed & Breakfast and was met by the sound of a man and a woman fighting upstairs. Her head was pounding too hard for her to distinguish who they were or what they were saying. She decided to head for the kitchen in an attempt to find the owner, Leena, and see if she had any ibuprofen.

Upon entering the kitchen, Emily found that Leena wasn't there. She didn't want to start rifling through the cupboards, so she tried to remember if she had anything she could take in her go-bag. Emily's thinking, mixed with the yelling from upstairs simply made her migraine worse though and she couldn't concentrate on anything. Emily leaned on the counter that sat in the middle of the kitchen for a moment in an attempt to subdue the vertigo that had decided to join the party.

After a minute or so, Emily felt good enough to make it up the stairs. She stood back up, turned around and almost jumped out of her skin when she saw that Leena was standing behind her.

_How long has she been standing there?_ Emily thought. She never even heard her come into the room.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you," Leena said sweetly.

"Oh, no it's okay. I was in here looking for you actually," Emily replied with a weak smile.

"I know," Leena said with almost no expression on her face.

"Alright." Emily was growing uneasy and it had everything to do with the way Leena was looking at her.

"You need me to get you something?" Leena asked, reminding Emily of the reason she was standing in the kitchen in the first place.

"Right," Emily said and shook her head. "Do you have any ibuprofen or something?"

"Of course," Leena replied calmly and walked over to a cabinet.

Emily couldn't understand how this woman could be so calm while there was a couple arguing upstairs. Yes, it would have been a little rude for Emily to go and ask them to stop, but coming from the owner? Not so much.

Leena handed Emily the bottle of ibuprofen followed by a bottle of water.

"Oh, I don't need the whole bottle." Emily tried to hand the bottle back to Leena after taking out two pills but Leena wouldn't have it.

"You don't now, but you will," Leena replied.

Emily narrowed her eyes and Leena. She had no idea what Leena was talking about or what she was implying; Emily just knew that her head hurt too much to figure it out.

"And with that odd comment, I'll be going upstairs," Emily said, grabbed her water off the counter and turned to go.

Emily reached the doorway to the hall when Leena's voice stopped her.

"Your shadows will follow you, no matter where you go or how fast you run."

The bed & breakfast suddenly went quiet, eerily quiet. The couple had finally stopped arguing and you could now hear every tick of the clock, the groans and cracks of the house.

Emily slowly turned back to Leena and saw that Leena was looking at her like she was a bug under a microscope.

_What the hell is that supposed to mean? _ Emily wanted to say to her, but being the polite woman her mother hired other people to raise she said, "Excuse me?"

But Leena never replied; she looked at Emily with that same calm, creepy look, turned and left out the other door that Emily wasn't blocking.

_Who is she to judge how I live my life? She doesn't even know me!_

_ Well she seems to know you a lot better than you know yourself right now._

_ Really? Even my voice of reason is conspiring against me now. _

Emily's head resumed its throbbing and reminded her as to why she was even at the bed & breakfast in the first place. She made her way down the hall and up the stairs to her room. When she reached her door she found that the arguing couple were no longer on the landing and it was still silent. Emily quickly entered her room, pulled off her shoes and jacket, closed the blinds and sat on the bed.

She finally took the medication knowing that she would be feeling like herself in a few short hours. Emily set the alarm on her phone to wake her up at two pm, and then she curled up under the covers and waited for sleep to claim her.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: I know, I suck for taking so long to update this. My plan to update once a week crashed and burned as you may have noticed. So now I'm just going to update whenever I can. I'm extremely busy the rest of April so I probably won't update again until May, sorry. You can always check my profile page for my story statuses and when I plan to update.  
>Anyway, I hope you liked the chapter. The second half of this one was more of a character-centric chapter because I didn't have the brain power or energy to put more of the case in. Chapter nine will definitely be more about the artifact so it should be interesting. If you guys have any ideas on what should happen next I'd love to hear them :)<strong>


	9. Chapter 9

Myka sat at the small table outside on the patio at Leena's eating her lunch. It was three o'clock and she was just waiting for Pete to come down so they could head back to the warehouse. They had come back at twelve for some much needed sleep while Artie did some research on the artifact. Myka had only gotten less than three hours of sleep but it was better than nothing.

Myka looked up and saw Pete walking through the side door while stretching his arms.

"I don't know about you, but I feel much better," he said with a grunt and sat down in the chair next to Myka.

"I do feel a little better," Myka replied reluctantly.

"Are you thinking rationally again?" Pete asked and took a bite of a chocolate chip cookie.

He was referring to the fight they had on the way back from the warehouse and continued to have at Leena's before they went to their rooms to sleep.

"I still stand by what I said," Myka said coldly.

"Well what you said is crazy and stupid," Pete mumbled around a mouthful of cookie.

"Do you really want to start this up again?" Myka barked. She could already feel her anger bubbling up to the surface.

"Yes, because we never actually finished our discussion the first time," Pete pointed out.

"Pete,that was not a discussion!" Myka exclaimed. "That was a way louder than a discussion, we were fighting."

"No we weren't."

"Yes we were."

"No."

"Yes."

"Okay are you two seriously fighting over whether or not you were fighting earlier?" Leena interrupted them.

"No," Pete said.

"Maybe," Myka said at the same time.

Leena sighed. "What were you even arguing about anyway?"

"Where Helena should stay while the FBI is in town," Myka told her.

"What were you thinking?" Leena asked Myka.

"Well she obviously can't stay here, so I was thinking the warehouse," Myka said with a pointed look at Pete.

"She's not staying at the warehouse!" Pete burst out. "Do you even realize how dangerous that could be?"

"Well where else is she going to go?" Myka said, matching Pete's voice level.

"Will you two please keep it down?" Leena said harshly. "In case you've forgotten, one of the BAU agents is here right now."

Myka and Pete continued to glare at each other. Leena sighed.

"Fine," Myka grumbled. "But we're continuing this conversation later."

"Of course we are," Pete said flatly.

Myka continued to eat her lunch while Pete did the same. Leena joined them at the table and they all sat in an awkward, angry silence.

"So are you any closer to finding it?" Leena asked, careful of her choice of words.

"We might be," Myka replied. "Artie's doing research now on possible... items that fit the criteria."

"Oh that's good," Leena said with a smile.

They lapsed into silence again. After a few minutes Pete said, "Where is she now?"

Myka was confused for a minute before realizing that Pete was talking about Helena.

"She's with Mrs. Fredrick," Leena said in a quiet voice. "They were here for a few minutes but left and I don't know where they went."

Pete nodded. Myka heard a door open and she -along with Leena and Pete- turned to the source. Agent Prentiss was standing there looking around. She was obviously waiting for someone.

"Leena, you never said it was Agent Prentiss who was here," Pete said in a hushed tone.

"Why does that matter?" Leena asked.

"Pete thinks he has a shot with her," Myka replied with fake enthusiasm.

"Oh I see... Well your presence in her life certainly wouldn't be a bad thing," Leena said with a shrug.

"Have I ever mentioned how creepy it is that you know that?" Pete said and grabbed a handful of cookies off the plate. Then Pete was getting up and making his way over to Agent Prentiss.

"Well this should be interesting," Myka mumbled.

Myka couldn't completely hear what was being said, but she interpreted things as best she could based on their body language. Prentiss looked annoyed as soon as Pete approached her and after he offered her a cookie -which she refused- she gave him the cold shoulder. Or at least she tried too. Pete just kept on talking, and talking, and talking. Finally almost five minutes later, Prentiss took the cookie Pete had offered her. A huge grin spread across his face at the small victory and Pete went back to the table.

"She so digs me," Pete said with a smirk.

"Pete, she only took the cookie to get you to go away," Leena pointed out.

"And she didn't even eat it," Myka said and pointed to the crushed cookie on the ground by Prentiss' foot.

Pete's face fell a little at the realization. "Well... I'm just one step closer to supper now," he said, looking on the bright side.

Myka rolled her eyes. "So what were you talking about?"

"Oh, nothing really." Pete shrugged.

"Alright whatever you say," Myka replied.

A black SUV pulled up in front of Prentiss and Agent Morgan got out and walked over to her. They talked for a moment, glanced back at Leena, Pete and Myka, then got into the vehicle and drove away.

"They know something," Myka said. "Did you guys see the look they gave us?"

"You're right," Pete agreed.

"We should get back to the warehouse," Myka said and quickly stood up. "And I'm driving," she added.

"Okay let's go," Pete said.

* * *

><p>"Hey guys," Myka said as she entered the warehouse. "How's it going?"<p>

"Oh perfect, you're back!" Artie exclaimed and turned back to the box he was going through.

"We've narrowed it down to four possible artifacts," Claudia told them.

"Sweet," Pete replied.

"Actually no, it's not," Artie corrected him. "The artifact could be on one of these four, meaning that there will still be three killer artifacts out there. Or it might not even be one of these."

"That's a good point," Myka agreed solemnly. "But we still think it's a knife that's the artifact right?"

"Yes, yes we do," Artie replied. "Aha!" he exclaimed and pulled a book from the box he was going through.

"What is that?" Myka asked as she went to get a closer look. She, Pete and Claudia all peered over Artie's shoulder as he flipped the pages.

"A book of all the best hunters and what they used as their choice of weapon," Artie informed them.

Artie stopped on a page, mumbled something and then kept going. After repeating this motion a few more times, he finally settled on a page.

"James 'Jim' Bowie," Pete read aloud.

"He was famous for his prowess with a knife and they named the Bowie Knife after him," Artie informed them. "He was killed in the Battle of the Alamo in 1836 and not all of his knives are in museums."

"Hey, that's it!" Claudia exclaimed and pointed to a picture of a knife.

"Okay," Myka said slowly as the wheels turned in her head. "If this is one of his knives, how did it get here?"

"That I cannot tell you," Artie said as he got up and went to the computer. "But what I can tell you is that this knife seems to be one of a kind. It was specially designed by our lovely friend here and he used it in the Battle that he died in."

"That still doesn't explain how it got here," Pete remarked.

"Well give me a minute and you'll get your answer," Artie snapped back. "Alright, it looks like Mr. Bowie has a relative living in Feather Head. Myka, take Claudia with you and see what she can tell us."

"Awesome!" Claudia exclaimed and went to grab her laptop.

"Wait, why can't I go?" Pete asked.

"I need your help here to try and figure out how the artifact works," Artie told him.

"Fine," Pete grumbled.

"Alright Claudia, let's head out," Myka said happily and they both left.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Hey guys. I'm so, so sorry for taking so long to update this. I know I said May, but then I had a ton of school projects and exams and shit like that. I never forgot about you guys though! I know this chapter is short; I _really_ suck at managing my time... **

**I want to thank you all for sticking with me and putting up with the sparse updates. And I especially want to thank aperceptionisonlyaperception; your reviews really gave me the kick in the ass I needed to start working on this again! Thank you to all those who have favourited and alerted this story since my last update.  
><strong>

****So what do you guys want to read in the next chapter? I can do the _Criminal Minds_ side of the case or the _Warehouse 13_, so let me know.  
><strong>**


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Well would you look at this, two updates in one month! I was reading over the whole story a few weeks ago and I noticed how badly edited it is. I don't have a beta so all the mistakes are my fault. I want to apologize for them and any that I make in the future, because who am I kidding, there will be some. I also want to say that I suck at profiling, that's why I put off writing it for so long. So when I was writing this chapter, I really didn't know what I was doing, even though I've seen pretty much every episode of **_**Criminal Minds**_**. So . . . Yeah. Happy reading!**

Morgan and Prentiss got back to the police department to find the rest of their team sitting around the table. Morgan had tried to make light conversation on the ride back but Prentiss wasn't in the mood for talking. While she seemed to be feeling better, Morgan didn't think she was one-hundred percent yet.

"Morgan, Prentiss, we're just about to start the preliminary profile," Hotch informed them.

"Do we even have enough for that?" Morgan asked and glanced around.

"The officers here are starting to doubt us," Rossi replied. "They don't think we need to be here."

"And Strauss is giving us until tomorrow to come up with some new leads. If we don't have any, then we have to move on to another case," Hotch added.

"Alright then let's get started," Prentiss said and sat down.

"The UNSUB is most likely white, between the ages of twenty-five and forty-five," Rossi began.

"He displays traits of an organized offender, as well as a disorganized one," Morgan continued.

"The blitz attacks suggest that he lacks the social skills to charm his victims, yet some of the victims invited him into their homes," JJ said. "He waits until he's alone with his victims, so he's patient."

"Nothing was stolen from the victims and there was no sexual abuse, so this is violence for violence sake," Reid added.

"There was a brief cooling off period, in which time he moved towns," Hotch stated. "Now he seems to be accelerating, but he's not getting sloppy."

"He leaves the bodies in somewhat public areas, so he's not afraid to get caught. He won't have a criminal record," Rossi said.

"He has a high level of precision and there's no experimentation which suggests he's fully evolved," Morgan said.

"But guys," Prentiss injected. "What about the fact that the murders that happened on the same nights were all really close together? Some of them were on different sides of the towns. How could one UNSUB get from place to place so fast without being seen?"

"Prentiss has a point," Hotch sighed.

"Okay, so what if it is a group?" Morgan asked. "It's the same murder weapon each time, so how do they work?"

"They could have made copies of the knife," Reid suggested. "Given the right tools, it is possible.

"Okay, so what changes in the profile?" JJ asked.

"We're most likely dealing with a pack mentality. Each person rationalizes their own behavior off the others," Rossi said.

"They're still white, between the ages of twenty-five to forty-five, there's no experimentation so they're not juveniles, and there doesn't appear to be any ideology," Prentiss said.

"How many UNSUBs are we dealing with though?" Morgan asked.

"Judging by the stab wounds," Reid replied and pointed at the pictures. "Maybe three or four. Some of the cuts are deeper than others, so one person is stronger than the others. And as Prentiss pointed out, some victims were killed by a left handed person, while others by a right handed person."

"There's at least one male in the group, if they're not all male, because a woman wouldn't have the ability to overpower some of these guys," Morgan voiced.

This warranted a few glares from JJ and Prentiss but they said nothing.

"They're definitely organized," Rossi said. "They wait and prowl the streets looking for victims at night."

"There was no vandalism," JJ reminded the group. "They went straight to murder, they leave no evidence, and they're not afraid of getting caught. They must have done this before."

"But Garcia already checked for similar cases and there aren't any," Morgan said. He _really_ hated this case; it was just so damn confusing.

"Well there was something that brought them together," Hotch said. "They don't stand out in the community; they're a part of it. However, they're killing in a small area so someone will recognize them."

Morgan sighed and looked around. That was the best they were going to get for a profile and they all knew it.

"Alright, let's go give the profile," Hotch instructed and rose from his seat.

"Which one? The single UNSUB or the group?" Prentiss asked.

This caused Hotch to pause. "Let's go with the group profile," he replied.

….

After giving the profile and talking to the local cops, the team established that there weren't any violent gangs in the area.

"This just makes no sense," Morgan huffed. "We've gone through all our leads and come up dry. There's got to be someone in this town who noticed something strange."

"What about people who are new to town?" JJ suggested.

Hotch called an officer over. "Do you know of any new residents in the town?" he asked.

"I don't believe anyone's moved here in the last few months," the officer replied. "The most recent people to come to town are the IRS agents. They got here last year and stay at the bed & breakfast for some reason."

"Do you know where their office is?" Reid asked.

"I know it's not in town," he said with a shrug.

"Thank you," Hotch said as the officer returned to his work.

"Why is it that everything seems to lead back to them lately?" Rossi pondered.

"Morgan, you asked Garcia to look into them right?" Hotch asked.

"Yeah she should have everything by now," Morgan replied and pulled out his phone.

"Prepare to be amazed!" Garcia answered.

"And why is that Garcia?" JJ asked with a chuckle.

"Because I finally found the IP address on the hacker!" she replied.

"Can you get into their system?" Reid questioned.

"Sadly Boy Genius, I cannot," Garcia admitted. "This computer system has Zatak Subsonic security systems that are even beyond my level of expertise."

"So where did they hack you from?" Prentiss asked.

"A warehouse barely outside of Univille."

"Did you find anything on the owners?" Hotch asked.

"The only thing I got is that it's owned by the government. The rest is super-secret that I can't get to," Garcia told them.

"Who else has told us that their work is classified?" Rossi responded.

"The Secret Service agents," Reid answered, not realizing the question was redundant.

"Have you gotten their files yet Garcia?" Hotch asked.

"Yes I have, and I must say, they certainly are some interesting reads."

"Okay, we already know a little about Claudia Donovan so let's start with her," Hotch instructed.

"Claudia Donovan, twenty-two years old, parents deceased when she was very young, was in her brother's custody until he disappeared for twelve years, then spent time in foster care," Garcia recited. "At age 19 she checked herself into a psychiatric care facility for four months then checked herself back out, but you guys already knew that. She's taking online university courses as well. She appears to be living at Leena's Bed & Breakfast at the moment."

"She's the youngest, right?" JJ asked.

"Yep."

"So what made her join the group? How did she get the job as Technical Analyst? Because they probably weren't accepting applications with what they do."

"JJ's right," Morgan agreed.

"Oh wait, I have something that might answer that," Garcia said. "Claudia's brother studied under a Professor Reynolds who had ties to Arthur Nielsen. Her brother worked with Arthur Nielsen for a while before dropping off the map."

"Maybe Claudia met him at some point in the past, and then when he needed someone, he sought her out," Prentiss suggested.

"That might be an option," Hotch said with a nod. "Let's move on to Arthur Nielsen."

"Whatever you say Boss Man," Garcia replied. "Special Agent in Charge Arthur Nielsen works for the Secret Service, sixty-four years of age and . . . Huh."

"What is it Garcia?" Morgan asked.

"The farthest back I can go into his background is to when he's twenty-six years old," she replied.

"Why is that?"

"There's nothing there before then."

"What do you mean?" Hotch asked, growing concerned.

"Arthur Nielsen must be an alias."

Everyone looked at each other; that wasn't good.

"What _do_ you have on him?" Prentiss asked.

"He's part of a classified division of the Secret Service," Garcia said. "He was employed around the same time the alias was made. I have no home address, but he does own a 1957 Jaguar XJ150 Cabriolet and a 1969 Chevrolet El Camino."

"And he's the one in charge?" Rossi asked no one in particular.

"There must be someone above him," JJ stated.

"Probably," Morgan agreed. "Who's next on our list Baby Girl?"

"Myka Bering, thirty one years old, grew up in Colorado Springs, Colorado," Garcia began. "Joined the Secret Service right after she finished school and was assigned to Denver, Colorado. While there, she had an affair with her partner Sam Martino, and it ended when he was killed trying to apprehend a criminal."

"Is that when she got reassigned to South Dakota?" Reid interrupted.

"Surprisingly no," Garcia replied. "She was transferred to the Presidential Protective Division, was on the fast track and served as Shift Lead. But then, after saving the President at an event a little over a year ago, was immediately transferred to an undisclosed location."

"I'm guessing that undisclosed location would be here," Prentiss commented.

"It would appear so Sugar Plum," Garcia said.

"Alright, what about Lattimer?" Hotch prompted her to continue.

"Pete Lattimer grew up in North Canton, Ohio. He's a recovering alcoholic, has one ex-wife, no kids. He was a Marine before joining the Secret Service. He was working the same case as Bering the night she saved the President and it appears that he too was immediately transferred after that incident," Garcia told them.

"Who ordered the transfer?" Rossi asked.

"I can't get much on it because it's classified as top secret. The only thing I have is that it was authorized by a single name, Frederic."

"Didn't the order to let Wells go, come from the same person?" Rossi looked to Hotch.

Hotch pulled the paper out of a folder and read over it. "Rossi's right. This Mrs. Frederic must be the one above Nielsen."

"So whatever's going on here, these people are a part of it," Morgan deduced.

"But they're Secret Service," Garcia reminded them. "They wouldn't just start killing people for no reason."

"We don't know what they would or wouldn't do," Reid said. "They certainly have the know-how to commit these murders and get away with it."

"We don't even know what their division is assigned to do," Prentiss said.

Hotch sighed. "Is there anything else Garcia?"

"Well we do know what the murder weapon is," Garcia said happily.

"What is it?" Reid asked.

"It's a one of a kind knife, made by James Bowie," she told them.

"The Bowie knife was named after him," Reid began his rant. "He died in the Battle of the Alamo in 1836. There are many museums exhibits dedicated to him that carry his weapons. So the UNSUBs could have broken into one of the exhibits and stolen the original knife, or copies were made and sold to other exhibits and they intercepted the shipment. That would explain how all the wounds were made by the same weapon."

"Garcia, can you-" Hotch started.

"Cross reference the murder weapon with other knives in the museums?" Garcia guessed. "I already did that. This knife isn't listed in any museum logs. I did however find a living relative to Mr. Bowie who lives Feather Head."

"Alright, Rossi and Reid, I want you to go talk to the relative in Feather Head, see if they know anything about the knife. Prentiss and JJ, go talk to the owner of the bed and breakfast, see if she knows where we can find Lattimer, Bering, Donovan and Nielsen. Morgan, you and I will go over the crime scenes, see how long it takes to get from one to the other."

The team nodded and headed out to do their designated tasks.

**A/N: Let me know who you want to see next. Oh! I also started another crossover fic with **_**Criminal Minds**_** and **_**Haven,**_** so if you watch both those shows you should check it out and let me know what you think of it. And if you don't watch **_**Haven**_**, I highly recommend you start watching it.**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: Hey guys, here's the next chapter! It's not all that great, but I don't really have a lot of time to write more. I'm super busy and I have been for the last couple months, so hopefully things will die down in October so I can write chapters that are much better than this one.**

* * *

><p>Leena was getting ready to go to the Warehouse to help Artie and Pete figure how the artifact worked when she heard the front door open. She quickly shoved the book she was holding under the couch and stepped into the hall.<p>

"Hello Agents," she said. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Yes, actually there is," JJ replied.

"Well, why don't we have a seat?" Leena gestured to the table in the room behind her and the three woman sat down.

"We know that Agents Bering, Lattimer and Claudia Donovan are currently residing here," Prentiss stated. "We're hoping you could tell us where we can find them while they're not here."

"Like, their office?" Leena asked, playing dumb. She received a nod in response. "No, I can't really help you there."

"Really? Because they've been living here for over a year. Wouldn't you know where their office is by now?"

"They might have mentioned it before, but I don't really remember."

"I find that very hard to believe," JJ said. "This is a small town, people must talk."

"And I saw you sitting with them earlier; you're all very friendly with each other," Prentiss added.

"So why don't you stop lying, and give us a real answer."

Leena looked from one profiler to the other, both were almost glaring at her. She knew she wouldn't be able to lie completely to the agents without them knowing, but she had to try.

"Look, I really don't know much about what they do," Leena said and looked at Prentiss, then JJ. "They're very secretive since they work for the government, so I don't ask questions."

"But you must know where their office is," JJ persisted.

"All I know is that it's not in town," Leena shrugged. "Sometimes I don't even see them for a few days, they go on a lot of business trips."

JJ and Prentiss shared a look and stood up.

"Okay well, if you think of anything that could help, you have your numbers," Prentiss said coldly.

The two agents walked to the door, and as soon as it was shut, Leena let out a sigh of relief. She knew they were suspicious of her involvement but at least she was able to hold them off for the time being.

* * *

><p>Emily and JJ climbed back into the SUV. They had learned almost nothing helpful, except that Leena might be involved in the case somehow as well.<p>

"She's protecting them," Prentiss said after a moment.

"Definitely." JJ nodded. "So what should we do now?"

"Doing it the old fashion way didn't work," Prentiss mused as she pulled out her cell phone. "So let's try the Garcia way."

Prentiss dialled the number then put the phone on speakerphone. "Hey Garcia, it's Emily and JJ," she said once she heard the click signalling Garcia had answered.

"How may I assist you, my fearless dames?"

"We need you to track the location of a cell phone," Prentiss told her.

"Piece of cake!" Prentiss recited the number to Garcia and not long after they had their reply. "Okay, so it appears that the phone is indeed on, but I can't get a definite location."

"Why is that?" JJ asked and glanced at Prentiss.

"It's bouncing off the two closest towers. Sorry I can't be of much more help."

"It's all right Garcia," Prentiss assured her.

"May I ask why you want me to track Pete Lattimer's cell?" JJ could hear the smile in Garcia's voice.

Prentiss sighed. "We need to find out where his office is and everyone we've talked to either won't tell us or they don't know."

"Okay, but we will have a talk about him when you have a free moment. I know he's been showing some interest in you," Garcia replied.

"Showing interest is an understatement." JJ scoffed.

"Awe guys, come on!" Prentiss wined.

"Fine, we'll continue this conversation later!" Garcia said and hung up.

* * *

><p>"Thank you for talking with us Carly," Myka said as she set down her coffee mug.<p>

"It's not a problem at all," Carly replied. "I just can't believe that I started this whole thing."

"Don't take this out on yourself. There's no way you could have known what was going to happen," Myka tried to reassure her.

"But I sold the box that had the knife in it to that guy," Carly said.

"Yes, but you don't know what he did with it after you sold it," Claudia reminded her.

Carly sighed. Myka and Claudia had spent the last hour trying to get decent information out of the twenty-seven year old. After Myka told her the nature of their visit, Carly had done nothing but beat herself up over her actions. Carly knew nothing about the knife, like where it came from or that it belonged in a museum.

"We should be getting back," Myka said as she rose from her seat.

Claudia moved to the front door, while Myka shook Carly's hand. Claudia suddenly cleared her throat.

"Uh Myka, can you come over here?" she asked.

"What's up?" Myka replied quietly. She heard the uneasiness in Claudia's voice and knew something was wrong.

Claudia pointed to the window and through the thin curtain, Myka saw agents Rossi and Reid getting out of their SUV.

"Crap," Myka muttered.

"Follow my lead," Claudia whispered and moved back to where Carly was in the living room. "Carly, I know this might sound weird, but I have this thing about exiting through the same door I entered a house through. May we go out the back door?"

Myka did her best to keep a straight face as Carly regarded Claudia with an expression that screamed, _"I think she's crazy!"_

"Yeah, sure," she said slowly. "It's right through this hall." She started to show Myka and Claudia out when her doorbell rang.

"You get that," Myka said. "We'll show ourselves out."

Myka and Claudia hurried out the back door and around to the side of the house. Once the were sure Rossi and Reid were inside, they ran to their vehicle that was parked on the side of the road and sped off.

* * *

><p>Rossi and Reid stood outside, waiting for the door to be answered.<p>

"This seems like a nice neighbourhood," Rossi commented.

"Not everything is always as it seems," Reid replied.

After a moment, Rossi regarded Reid more closely and found him to be in deep thought. "You didn't add on a useless fact to the end of your sentence," Rossi pointed out. "What's eating at you?"

"I'm just trying to figure out this case," Reid said quietly.

"Well, hopefully we'll get a lead from here."

At that moment, the door opened and a woman with light brown hair, and red rimmed eyes stood staring back at them.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

"Yes," Rossi said. "Are you Carly?"

She nodded.

Rossi and Reid both pulled out their badges. "I'm Agent Rossi and this is Dr. Reid; we're with the FBI."

"FBI?" Carly repeated.

"Yes, we have some questions we need to ask you involving the current murder investigation," Reid said.

"Oh okay. Come in." She opened the door fully and directed Rossi and Reid to the living room to the left of the door.

Rossi noticed that she didn't appear to be very surprised at their presence, and she looked like she'd been crying recently. Rossi and Reid sat down on the couch, while Carly occupied the chair. Rossi noted the plate of cookies, and two extra half-empty cups of coffee sitting on the table in front of him.

"You want to know about the knife, right?" Carly asked before either agents could begin the conversation.

"That's correct," Reid replied and glanced at Rossi. "How did you know that?"

"Do government agencies working the same case not talk to each other or something?" Carly asked. At the blank stares she received, she continued. "A couple Secret Service agents were just here asking about the same thing."


End file.
